Oyster Sashimi, Olive Martini
by lucius-complex
Summary: Because really, who else would be insane enough to slurp sexy aphrodisiac foods with their arch-enemies but Tony Stark?
1. Chapter 1

**Oyster Sashimi, Olive Martini **

Before it all started, if you had told Tony Stark that the god of mischief would turn out to be_ this_ easy to domesticate, he'd have cracked a rib laughing in your face.

And if you'd been foolish enough to tell Loki himself, he'd probably have cracked all your ribs _and_ your face.

That didn't stop it from being true though. And this is how it happened.

1

There's no grace here: Tony Stark practically_ falls_ through the door in his haste to get into the apartment as soon as possible.

He locks the door behind him as if a thousand Chitauri infantrymen are behind him; then fishes out the vibrating mobile that that had been burning a hole in his jeans pocket and tosses it on the sofa like it's on fire.

For a good fifteen seconds he stares at the mobile as it bobs valiantly amidst the sea of cushions, ringing shrilly and scrapping its chalkboard nails against Tony's conscience.

But he is Tony Stark, he's no ordinary mortal, and he's had _a lot_ of practice at ignoring guilt.

The phone finally stops ringing, and Tony begins to breathe again, to take stock of the spare apartment he keeps around precisely for moments like this. The last time a woman had necessitated his hiding out here Interpol had pegged as a spy; working for the Chinese government who'd wanted Tony to part with some of his science secrets.

But this time Tony knew he was in much more danger.

Tony was a man unafraid of a living with little risk, but even he wasn't stupid enough to go against the force of nature that was Pepper Potts, and Pepper was currently very, very angry with him. Something about the last stack of papers he's signed being void because of some pervy doddle or other and how some of them consequently ended up online, unravelling a deal she'd been working on for months. He's a little hazy on the details, but Bruce had sent him a discrete text telling him to vamoose from Stark Tower until the coast was clear.

_Fine._ No problem. He could make do without JARVIS or Alterna Ten edible shampoo for a few days; there's enough video games and alcohol in the apartment to make for it a very spiffy party for one, and Pepper would come down from the thundercloud she is riding. Eventually. It's all good.

He's about to stick his head in the fridge when the phone starts to ring again, and Tony startles, tries too quickly to straighten up, and ends up banging his head on the door and swearing for several colourful moments. Which is lovely, because by the time he's run out of invectives, the buzzing from the mobile starts again, so Tony hightails it to the balcony as if Pepper herself was glaring at him from the couch and slams the soundproof sliding doors behind him with satisfaction. Hah. Let's see who gets who's knickers in a twist.

He quickly comes down from the high, however. Here he is, king of the world, booted out of his own castle and hiding in some tower like a girl.

Thank god there's no one to witness his shame.

Taking a deep breath, the billionaire proceeds to admire the vista he probably hasn't checked out in years – or maybe never checked out – yeah, that would be more likely – and it's just like any other six million-dollar apartment view until Tony's gaze collides with the shape of a shadowy figure seated outside the ledge of Tony's balcony, whom for one heart stopping moment he's certain is Pepper with a very sharp knife about to dismember him.

(Tony Stark is more frightened of CEO ex girl-friends than ninja burglars. His liberal arts Feminist teacher would have been proud.)

Instead of going back inside to pick up a weapon or call the cops like any sane person, Tony leans over the balustrade and says sharply; 'FYI spiderman you're trespassing, even if it's a hell of an impressive stunt getting up here.'

He raises an eyebrow when the shadow doesn't even shift in discomfort or surprise; merely snort at his words. Obviously, compliments were just _wasted_ on some.

He's just about to threaten the shadow with his suit when he looks down at the impossibly narrow ledge and sixty four floors and realizes that half-octopus or not, no robber would be able to climb so high. Or maintain that relaxed sprawl on a three inch ledge. Or wear a fucking _cape_ in this kind of wind.

So of course, it totally figures that the face that looks up at him calmly from the darkness would be one crazy-ass, supposedly incarcerated alien god of mischief.


	2. Chapter 2

2

'This is not your tower, Man of Iron, your name is not on it. It belongs to Calatrava.'

Cala-_who_? Tony just stands there blinking for several seconds before he cottons on to Loki's alien logic. 'I can see why it might look that way to an outter space dude; you flew to Stark Tower, where Tony Stark lives, so you assume that's how its done. Sound logic and that does kind of happen, but with houses, Rudolph, and I do so own this tower. Plus the couple next to it too, because you'd really pity the man who's mammy christianed 'The Nexus Next Door' at birth.'

The god of mischief seems unwilling to take him at his word, however. Or even move. 'I've been enjoying this vista for a fortnight and have never seen you before,' he mutters, and his voice sounds downright accusing.

Jesus, has Reindeer Games been prancing around the balconies of New York lofts for half a _month _without SHIELD's notice? How many people had he already killed? Shiftily Tony's eyes begins to measure the fastest route back to the suit as his mouth continued on auto-pilot.

'I like to keep a spare house lying around, just in case some crazy-assed alien god tries to blow up my tower again. So, sorry to break it to you pal, but you're the squatter here.'

There's this split second between them, where adrenaline washes into Tony's bloodstream and he's absolutely _certain_ that the Loki is actively thinking of throwing him off the tower – but then the God's eyes flicker; luminescent even in the darkness, and although he doesn't so much as move an inch there is just the slightest shift in the way the air feels around Tony, like a high beam laser that's just been powered down.

'I suppose the quiet would not have stayed unbroken long,' Loki finally grunts with no small amount of resignation in his voice, adding, 'If it's all the same to you, I should like to admire the night for some moments longer without resorting to bloodshed.'

And Tony is left with his mouth hanging open as Loki dismisses him with a look and turns back to stare at the sky, completely ignoring him.

For some reason, his brains or maybe his ego's not happy about that. Not one bit, so Tony clears his throat. 'Soooo I think you just stole my line. And you're also much crazier than previously imagined if you think I'm going to let you out of sight, Gargamel, after what you did on your first visit.'

Its added proof that the god must truly be in some kind of State, because instead of threatening him with six kinds of violence or just skipping the talk for even more effective violence he merely sighs and leans back against the balustrade with his eyes closed.

'Suit yourself Stark, but do it afterwards.'

Tony frowns at this. Shuffles. Purses his lips in a manly way, and finds himself _still_ ignored by a god: one who doesn't seem overly concerned about the arch-nemesis standing about a foot away, possibly with backup and suits and tasers; whilst Loki himself is perched in (relative) precariousness.

Okaaaaay.

Something was just not adding up. For starters, Loki's current frame of mind defies categorization under Foaming-Homicide or Monologing-Evil-Overlord; which Tony has pegged down as his only two default setting. Neither does he seem to be toting the usual Asgardian armour, and he hasn't once asked Tony to bow.

Most telling of all, Tony's own self-protecting mechanism isn't urging him to run screaming away; at the most it just occasionally whimpers the tiniest bit; and intuition is the most valuable thing Tony has and the only reason for his repeated feats of- well, everything.

Discreetly he checks himself to see if he's being mind-controlled (alien-gods insult list check. Passwords to favourite porn sites check). Ok, not in immediate danger then, and a Tony that isn't in immediate danger has a tendency of wanting to get closer to it.

He leans over a little more, attempting to see what little he can of the god's still features and ready to shove him over at a moments notice. Loki's eyes are closed, and Tony's brain just kind of freezes for a moment because he appears for lack of a word, to be letting the wind flow through his face and hair, tilting his jaw in subtle directions. It's such an innocent motion that it leaves Tony confused and even more suspicious, but also feeling very much like an intruder. Which is rich considering who he is, and furthermore this being his city/planet ect – but then Loki does look kind of wretched, not that Tony feels remotely sorry.

Still. Given what he knows of the god's towering pride, it would take getting past a certain breaking point to be uncaring of a foe's presence behind you. That, and a great deal of numbness.

So maybe Tony can afford to be kind for one night. Even magnanimous, because seriously, he's beginning to feel like Scar about to pry Muffasa's paws off the ledge. Or Scrooge about to bah-humbug Fred.

'If you'd cease polluting the air with overloud-thoughts, I shall finish my meditation and be gone in but a moment,' Loki suddenly says with his eyes still closed, and really it's just getting a wee bit offensive, the way he seems to act like Tony's more mother hen than mighty ninja. Why does the whole world think Tony Stark is harmless out of his suit?

'You look terrible, Prancer. What's eating ya?'

Again that genteel snort. 'Your unwanted presence, to begin with.'

'You can be nice. I'm just being a good Samaritan, making sure you know that no matter how many boo boos you make, you can always make amends if you're really sorry and there's no need to jump.'

'My heart does thrill at your concern, Man of Iron. Now do go away.'

No way he's going to let a mad god capper around his balcony without supervision. He could be planning to set the building on fire for all Tony knew.

'Come on, Reindeer Games, you know bloody well I can't unsee you now; superhero duty and all that, so why don't you just come in and l-'

Tony draws back, suddenly finding a very sharp knife at his throat and _dam his intuition because he's never trusting it again._

'IF you attempt to take me hostage,' the tired voice turns deadly in the split second it takes for Loki's dagger to reach his throat and _oh hello there_ because the god is suddenly on his feet and they're standing nose to nose. 'I shall kill you before your suit breaks through that flimsy pane of glass. Do not test me, Man of Iron.'

'Ok no test. Ok? I know what it feels like to want to take a time out, so, go right ahead. I just recalled owing you a drink, is all.'

'A_ drink_,' the god of mischief echoes flatly, and whilst he doesn't withdraw his dagger he does allows Tony to shift away in gradual degrees, which is maybe but not quite the same thing.

'Yes, drink. Comes in a glass and makes you happy. There's one with your name on it inside, if you promise to play nice and not blow anyone up. Deal?'

'You propose a truce.'

_Did_ he just do that with earth's most reviled super villain? Yeah, maybe he did. Tony shrugs. Two brow-beaten bros recovering from the blows of life. Tony's been there before. He can be nice.

So even though all his senses are screaming at him _to _get into the suit_ right now_ Tony forces himself to turn his back and stroll back to the glass doors casually as you please.

'Come on, Rudolph, we're both of us pretty high on somebody's shit list and everyone can use a break from normality. I'll call a truce for tonight, if you will.'

The look Loki gives him is both alien and inscrutable. Then the god shrugs.

'Very well, Man of Iron. Lead the way.'

_Magnanimous_ Tony Stark, he can live with that


	3. Chapter 3

3

So here they are at the bar, and Tony is going through the motions of getting his mixers out while an alien prince stares gloomily at nothing from across the counter, and the night just does not get any more _surreal._

'What's your poison?'

'I do not know the taste of Migardian alcohol,' Loki grunted. 'The only ethylated beverage we have on Asgard is a particularly strong strain of mead and you only have to meet mine brother to be leery of its profound effects on the brain.'

'Whoa, back up there. _Alcohol _options_._ You mean to tell me on Asgard you get a grand choice of _one_?'

'Or none,' the god's smile was sardonic. 'Which for some, comes up to a grand choice of two.'

'Jesus, I won't even begin to touch on how tragic a state of affairs it must have been for you to grow up like that,' Tony said fervently, barely restraining from making the sign of a cross because he's raised right and knows how be discrete in the presence of a spiritual competitor. 'Small wonder you turned out so angst-ridden, Reindeer Games, with nothing else to drown your sorrows in.'

'If you think that your pathetic mortal diversions are up to such a task, you are welcomed to try.'

'Challenge _accepted_ Rudolph! We'll mellow-out that killer instinct from you yet. I've always been a firm believer in alcohol's propensity to sooth the savage beast; I keep telling Bruce- Dr Banner to give it a try for science-' he trails off at Loki's expression narrows. _Whoops._

Instead of blowing his top Loki surprises him again by wryly commiserating.

'For the sake of your _science_ then, I might just consider supplying you a vat of Asgard's foul mead in the hopes of pickling your giant green friend to a more wieldy size.'

The thought _is_ funny. Come on, Tony's not being disloyal just because he laughs a little.

Loki doesn't laugh however, so Tony's forced to cut it short.

'So, what will it be? We have fermented, distilled, fortified; and then grades, flavouring, bottle aesthetics – green seems to be your thing – I'm a single malt man myself but hey, the cupboards are full and you're free to try them all.'

Loki waves a careless hand. 'Server's choice. They make no difference to me.'

'You know, you might regret saying that to a guy who spent more college nights sleeping in a booth after a pub crawl than a hobo-'

'I regret _nothing_,' Loki suddenly snarls, curling his fist and wow, is that coloured electricity because it's kind of pretty. Pretty scary, that is. Deep-seated issues ahead, _excellent_ chances of stormy weather. Tony counts himself duly warned.

'Everybody regrets something. Like that cheeseburger I left in the mustang for eight days, I really regretted that, and I really, _really_ regretted the cleaning bill.'

'You know nothing, mortal. Do not presume to try.'

As he gazes at Loki's closed-off expression however, it occurs to Tony that his miserable guest wouldn't be here, unless he really didn't want to be alone. So. Tony's diagnosis: Things are pretty much sucking for Reindeer Games right now; but especially sucky is the feeling of hating the people around you whilst still needing them. Cool. Tony can roll with that, because he's _magnanimous._

'Tell you what, oh god of lies,' Tony said as he deposited several random bottles on the counter with a thunk. 'There's only one way to settle this.'

Loki simply raises an eyebrow at him, not a challenge but not entirely unengaged either.

'And what might that be?'

_'Shots.'_

**_~o0o0o~_**

Alien blood or no, Loki can certainly get as roaring drunk as the best of them.

After a lot of shots (and Tony wasn't kidding, they _decimated_ his stocks) they finally settled on a clear winner for Loki's beverage of choice – a Stoli Elit Himalayan edition on rocks. Which kinda figures. Its also discerned that Loki holds a preference for the taste of crisper liquids – gins, vodkas, dry Vermont. Bonus if they tastes of herbs or grass, better still if it involved a refinery process through a haystack.

'Figures you'd be a bit of a fairy, Reindeer Games.'

'Say that to me sober and armed tomorrow, Man of Iron, that I may pull your entrails from you in fair conscience,' Loki growls at him whilst simultaneously trying to pour a drink and park his ass down on the sofa: he misses the sofa but not the glass, and Tony likes a man who's got his priorities straight.

In fact, after a couple of hours of amicable company and maybe burning off some stomach lining Tony is beginning to wonder why the world finds Loki remotely scary in the first place. Just _look_ at him sliding around the pillows and cursing in Asgardian; Loki is _adorable_. And also very clearly misunderstood, so Tony swears to his new shield bother that bright and early tomorrow he'd go out up SHIELD and put things _right_, because that's what superheroes do. They toast to it because it's such a good idea. Several times. From a mug.

Like good shield brothers, Tony also commiserates when Loki tells him about some of his foster father's experimental punishment; Tony is aghast, then angry, and then avowing eternal vengeance against all unfit extra-terrestrial fathers, until Loki's honour and lust for eyeball squishing and entrail-eating is satisfied.

'Imaginative,' is all Loki says, but he raises his glass nonetheless.

'And now I believe it's time you tell me your pater familias story, seeing as so much fury cannot possibly come from mere commiseration alone.'

_That _shuttles Tony back on his ass. 'Damn, but you cotton on quick.'

'I am a_ god_,' Loki says, sounding almost bored by the number of times he's had to remind Tony this late into the night.

'So's Thor.'

Loki thinks about this. 'Touché.'

But fair's fair, so Tony man's up, pulls off the cork of a new bottle whose label he can no longer read and settles in to tell his tale.

'There's nothing much to say. I was ignored, I got in his way too much, yadda yadda no big deal. He wasn't in my life much, but hey, at least I got to stay out late and never get grounded. He was.. hard to please. Bit of a self-righteous prick. I picked up the prick part from him, but hopefully- not so much of the other bits.'

'Hmm.'

'Hey, there's a _huge_ difference between self-righteous and standing up for right. But- that's for another day- so… since pappy made weapons, I figured I'd do that too. I went off and made the best weapons in the world, and I told myself it was enough because I'd beaten him at his own game, for once in my life he'd sit up; he'd look at me instead of _through_ me. Until one day I looked in the mirror and realized he'd won after all. He'd created a weapon I couldn't surpass.'

'You,' Loki finishes for him, and there was a look on his face that was too sharp, too piecing, and _nowhere near drunk enough _for Tony's liking.

'Yep. Me. Told me so to my face after I confronted him; turns out that_ I'm_ Daddy dearest's biggest, baddest money-minting, murder-making weaponised son of a cold-hearted fuckin-'

'Man of Iron,' Loki interrupts, and Tony blinks. 'Your story. Please.'

'Oh. _Huh_. Well, one day he died. Kaboom. Took my mom with him, so- yeah. Free as a bird now, I guess.'

'Free at last,' the god of mischief muses, 'or trapped forever?'

Something in Tony's consciousness crawls to the surface and starts wailing in a terrible voice at Loki's words, but he clamps the door firmly shut. 'Doesn't matter anymore, does it? But hey, I guess daddy issues are just as universal as bad fashion sense.'

'I believe. I shall. Drink to that,' Loki very carefully enunciates. 'To fathers. May their flesh be seared from their bones for all eternity in the fires of KvØllheimr.'

'To _bad_ fathers,' Tony amends before tipping his glass down his throat and turning over to squint at the dejected deity in his living room. Damn but it was difficult to get a reading on how inebriated the god is.

Loki simply glowers at his attention_. 'What?'_

'You might want to lie down before you end up puking all over the X-box, Dancer.'

Loki frowns from his sprawled position half-on, half-off the sofa. 'Your conversation skills are as poor as they are arbitrary, Man of Iron, for I am not found of dancing.'

'I wasn't referring to dancing per say, I- _oh_ what the hell, do you even _know_ what a Christmas Carol is?' Tony stumbles to his feet and stands there swaying for a good minute. 'Hey JARVIS, play Rudolph here his official anthem, will ya?'

Silence met his request and Loki's two faces turned a particularly expressive shade of Smirk that Tony didn't like.

'I really should link this place to the grid.' Except that then Pepper would find out, and that sort of defeats the purpose of Tony's manly hiding hole. 'Fuck it, I'll just -_hic_- sing it to you, alien man. Prepare to swoosh. To swot. To swoon.'

'I see I'm about to be in for a treat,' Loki declares dryly as he waves his empty glass at Tony. But if I'm going to listen to more drivel from you tonight you had best prepare to keep this refreshed as well.'

**_~o0o0o~_**

He wakes up with a mouthful of X-box remote control and a hangover the size of the Burj Al-Arab trying to force itself though his left eye socket.

'OW,' Tony says unhappily to himself. Attempting to sit up convinces him that Loki had indeed blown the building up after Tony had passed out, the prick; because upright was suddenly seventy degrees followed by a mad scramble for the toilet bowl. (Thank god all his spare apartments came with the exact same layout so that he wouldn't have to remember where the WCs or re-orientate himself to a new bar.)

It takes a long, long time before Tony manages to make his way back to the living room, assisted by obliging bits of furniture.

He gazes at the wrecked hall, and tries not to smile because it _hurts._ Judging from the mess, they must have had a smashing good time.

Tony's gaze picks its way across the bottles jammed under the couch and the wine ring stains on the carpet. There was no sign at all that could have indicated the god's presence yesterday.

Huh. Didn't even leave a note or number, how rude.

No surprises there. He scrunches up his face and debates again the option of alerting SHIELD of the Loki's return. There's no need to reveal the circumstances, per say, but maybe a hint - _we bumped shoulders coming out of 7-11, _that sort of thing, and that'd be a job well done and no sleep lost over it.

Except Tony knows that the second word gets out, the Avengers would be deployed to turn every available rock or crevice over looking for Loki; and Thor would be called back, and Thor's booming voice in the kitchen at 8am every morning is a very, very bad for people with hangovers.

Tony picks up his mobile and tells himself that he's in no way forgetting that this is the god of _lies_ he'd just stayed up cavorting with all night, but they _did_ agree to a truce and nobody got hurt and his apartment is still standing.

He pockets his phone instead. Guess there's only one way to find out.

**_~o0o0o~_**


	4. Chapter 4

4

A week passes, and the temptation to go back to the other apartment to check on Loki is an itch that refuses to subside.

It's an itch Tony can't afford to scratch, at least not if he wants to remain virtuously guilt-free and daintily exculpable of his negligence in reporting the presence of a certain villainous would-be conqueror to his teammates and SHIELD. Luckily for him, this negligence has becomes increasingly easier to justify as days go by without any reports of deaths, explosions or stolen sources of power.

It appears Loki is keeping to his side of the bargain, which is both suspicious and terrifying; and Tony's head has been playing host to a litany of _whywhywhy_s – what's Loki up to? What's his game?

In other news, Tony Stark has also had all week to admit that showing off his alcohol collection to Loki had been _fun._ Fun in a way that bordered on _innocent_, (the word itself makes Tony shudders), save on his liver and the housekeeping staff.

And wasn't that just the most satirical thing ever?

Conclusion: certifiable as this makes him, Tony Stark would not mind going for round two with one unstable little god of mischief, whom he suspects is sulking through some sort of prison sentence on earth, though they hadn't spoken about it. He knows better than to bring it up with Anton Chigurh II though, so it'd just have to wait till Thor gets back from doing whatever he does on Asgard.

So Tony waits, and carry out lengthy arguments in his head on the wisdom and necessity of stalking making sure the god of mischief is not up to any- well, mischief. Given all these reasons and more, the dominant emotion Tony Stark feels when he sees Loki casually walking through the balcony of Avengers Tower that self-same evening is _relief_, coupled with a healthy side of _guilt_, and a worrying lack of _fear_.

'_Hi_ there, so glad and paranoid to see you,' he greets because _how the fuck did he get past the alarms without Tony knowing?_

'Man of Iron,' Loki nods in greeting, and the expectancy on his face makes Tony feel as if they'd spent the interim week apart chatting on whatsapp and setting up a date.

(Did Tony just say date? He means this of course in the most platonic sense.)

'Looking _much_ chirper this time round, Reindeer games; I trust you had a good sleep.'

At this Loki made a face. 'Your Miguardian alcohol is as vile as it is poisonous. I suffered abhorrently for days.'

'Nothing you didn't sign up for, Dasher. There were _label _warnings, didn't you read? I'll admit I'm sort of surprised to see you still hanging around however; whatever happened to my planet being below your notice and all that?'

At this Loki gives him a haughty look. 'Perhaps Migard shall pose a passable distraction whilst I ponder and recover my strengths.'

'You know if I squint _really_ hard, that sentence could actually be construed as a compliment. Be still my heart. But listen, you're currently standing just a couple of floors above a bunch of people who _really _dislike you, Dasher; and I don't know if you want to be hanging around.'

'I see,' the god of mischief arches an eyebrow. 'And was your open balcony not a deliberate invitation for me to- _hang around?'_

_Fuck_. He _knew_ it was too obvious from the start, but did he bother to pay attention to the voice in his head? _Nooooo. _'See, its good you brought that up, Dancer, becau-'

'I'm sorry to interrupt your conversation; Mr Steve would like to know if you would to join them for dinner today.'

He has never _loved_ JARVIS so much. 'Say no for me JARVIS, thanks. Tell them, _ah-_ tell them I've got a very agile potential investor I need to charm over to the dark side.'

'Very good, sir.'

Loki becomes immediately intrigued with his AIs invisible presence. 'So _this_ is JARVIS.'

'I'm pleased to meet you, sir.' JARVIS replies as Tony fervently prays to all deities, including the one present that his AI is not downstairs telling Steve that he's got SHIELDs most wanted criminal in his room.

Mummy Steve would have a coronary.

'The pleasure is mine,' Loki replies with the in-breed courtesy of a prince before he turns around and smirks at Tony. 'You seem to be a deal more refined in manners than your master, robot.'

'Thank you for the compliment sir. Just like Mr Stark, I am still very much a work in progress-'

'Thank you JARVIS, that will be all,' Tony hastily cuts in before his AI could unravel anymore of the dignity he's just clawed back. 'So. Now you've met my online butler. What else? I'd offer to give you the five cents tour, but I'm not sure if I can foot the bill of rebuilding the tower again so soon, which is likely to be the case if somebody catches sight of you.'

At this Loki seems to almost hesitate, which is so uncharacteristic that Tony knows he must be planning something completely _badass_.

'What I'd like, Man of Iron, is to go for another drink.'

Tony blinks, but the world doesn't right itself and nobody jumps out of the curtains with cake or cameras yelling Punked.

_'Urm.'_

'Perhaps even in one of your migardian dining halls.'

'_Sure._ Yeah. No problem. We'll just mosey over to Club Macanudo for all of the _five_ minutes it would take somebody's camera to upload everybody's favourite city-wrecking alien having a drink with _weapons _manufacturer Tony _Stark_, before SHIELD comes over with the straight-jackets. No can do, Dancer.'

Loki does not deign to reply, merely drops his head – and when he straightens his face is both familiar and unrecognisable.

Tony whistles. 'Well god-_damn_, Reindeer Games.'

'I am the god of _mischief, _Stark. Do you think a small feat of disguise beyond me?'

'Blond, huh. Now you really look like brothers. Ok _forget_ I said that, there's no need to crack static electricity at me, I have sensitive equipment_all over_ the place- please? _Please?'_

_****__~o0o0o~_

Nobody dares to get into the same elevator as Tony Stark, so it's as good a time as any to remind Loki of the rules.

'Remember what we spoke about Reindeer Games? It's all over for us both if your disguise falls off at any point.'

The god of mischief heaves a long suffering sigh. 'It will not.'

'Our truce still stands right.'

'It stands.'

'So no killing, maiming, or evil over-lording over the waiting staff? Just leave a tip and hold back any homicidal thoughts till we leave?'

'I'll try to contain myself,' Loki says dryly. 'Or you may _try_ to contain me, and see if you survive the experience.'

His eyes are blue tonight. Human. There are laugh lines around his mouth, and damn but Loki cleaned up _good_ and this might actually work.

The more Tony thinks about it the more enthusiastic he becomes. 'After dinner we could go over to 63rd; the view is great. You'll like it. We could even get you a cocktail; you look like you could be a cocktail kinda guy.'

He doesn't know why, but instead of being pleased Loki suddenly glares at him as if mortally (immortally) offended.

'Stark! You _dare_-'

'W_-what! What'd I say?'_

_****__~o0o0o~_


	5. Chapter 5

5

Bloodshed is avoided when the elevator pings opened and the crowd parts naturally for Tony Stark and his scowling blond companion.

The maître d'hôtel comes rushing out to greet and usher them to a private dining area in a highly affected ritual of revolting obeisance. Tony stuffs his hands into his pockets and skulks past the demimonde, some of who could be seen discretely pulling out their phones for a screen shot. Loki, of course, swans past the tables and carries himself as if the attention is due him.

They are led to a corner with heavy dark curtains and transparent glass walls and Tony tries really, really hard not to splutter when the manager draws away the curtains with a flourish and declare their specially partitioned corner as possessing of one of the most romantic one in all of New York city.

Damn his playboy reputation to hell, because this probably the first time in Tony's life he's ever been embarrassed by it.

He can feel Loki's amusement draped like a physical weight around him as he slides into the chair and plants his mortified face _deep_ into the menu. After a prolonged silence, which Tony fills by humming determinedly to himself and Loki fills with a great deal of grinning; the maître d'hôtel finally stops shuffling bewilderedly between them and takes his leaves.

'_Why_ Stark,' Loki murmurs as soon as they were alone, '-you only had but to ask._'_

Tony dares himself to look across the marmoreal table. 'I asked for some place _private_ because it's going to look _odd_ when I explain the use of a fork to you, Reindeer Games.'

The god of mischief however, having clearly recovered from his earlier bout of outrage is having none of it, and his lips curl up with a devastating, horrifyingly amused expression that inexplicably reminds Tony of all the stereotype evil cats that he'd ever seen on TV.

'I had not realised the adulation accorded to you amongst your fellow mortals, Man of Iron. The depths of their regard of you is quite-'

'Shallow? Conniving? Sycophantic?'

'And yet you protect them; these people whose regard you feel nothing for.'

'It's a calling. Shall I order for you?'

The god of mischief tapped a delicate finger at the menu card he hadn't bothered to read. 'Be my guest.'

**_~o0o0o~_**

Tony is absolutely sure there's something wrong with the food. There must be. His guts have been churning all night and his latent hyperhidrosis really is turning on the faucet tonight, which leaves him wiping his hands on the napkin every time he puts down a fork.

What a charming sight he must make._ Not_ that he cares.

'How's the food treating you, Dancer?'

The god takes his time to answer. 'It is- _interesting_, this human tendency of altering beyond recognition that which you eat.'

Tony laughs. He's beginning to really enjoy having an alien perspective around. Thor had filled the Avengers in on the Asgardian culture of noisy banquet halls and whole boars roasting slowly on spits. Tony and Clint had been immediately intrigued by the flisting and drinking games that Thor described, but Bruce had blanched and half-joked that they'd need to build a new hall after every feast.

Try as he might though, he couldn't place Loki in such a setting.

'Not your kind of repast, huh?'

He watches Loki take another delicate bite of his cassoulet and announce; 'It is passable. And I do not have a_ kind_ of repast. Food has ever been something dispensed with whenever it was convenient to do so.'

'We can leave, you know. Find an acre of forest or two; shoot us some deer; I'm sure Hawkeye wouldn't miss a couple of arrows. Or would you feel better if it's not a member of your family, Ruldoph? How about partridge?'

Loki scowls at this. 'Asgardian food has never particularly moved me, and I am perfectly capable of finishing a migardian meal without your mollycoddling, Stark.'

'Oh, my bad. Do carry on.'

Loki does indeed, carry on, and Tony watches it all with the most _morbid_ fascination. Loki looks almost dutiful when he eats, sort of formal and domesticated and Tony wonders if all psychopaths are this tidy and fastidious.

Probably. Yeah. Hannibal Lector was probably the kind of guy who buffed his silverware till they _shined._

At some point Loki raises an eyebrow at his unabashed gawking, and Tony has done worst things in life without batting an eyelash; he shouldn't feel like he's been caught with a hand in the cookie jar.

Even _if_ smuggling a universally wanted alien around is probably illegal in all fifty states.

By the time their awkward meal is cleared away, Tony is ready to concede defeat.

'Really, this was not half as fun as last week.'

Or at least it wasn't until the watermelon slices arrive, and _then_ Tony realises that the evening has finally began.

**_~o0o0o~_**

'And what is _this?'_

'This, this is the gelato version.'

'As opposed to _this?'_

'That's the ice-cream version; which I've just explained contains milk and cream and other stuff that Pepper- that women avoid unless they're watching RomComs.'

Tony watches Loki sort through his stash of watermelon flavoured food as if they were artefacts capable of unlocking great secrets.

He doesn't think he's had this much fun in _years._

The god wrinkles his nose in distaste as he picks up a shrivelled red blob wrapped in shrink wrap.

'And why is _this_ one amongst our acquisitions?'

'That's just how watermelon looks when its dried; I don't think I've ever tried this before.' Tony lifts up a strip and chews experimentally on it. 'Kinda weird if you ask me.'

'It looks toxic,' the god mutters. 'Such fragile bodies and short life spans, but you insist on filling yourselves with things that kill you all the faster.'

In the privacy of the limo Loki had dropped the 'quiet human' charade but not the disguise; he's still blond and short haired and sporting a pinstriped tie which Tony finds adorable for reasons he can't put his finger on. It must be the blue eyes; something about it makes Loki look almost vulnerable; and for some reason cute things on a dangerous animal equals hot in Tony's fevered brain.

Or maybe Tony simply has a kink for living on the edge. Probably._ Yesh._

'So are we done? Happy with your stash? Come on Dancer, places to be and drinks to try before the night ends.'

The god begins to gather his acquisitions reluctantly. 'And what would you show me now, Man of Iron?'

'Tonight? Just another typical Migardian mead hall,' Tony says, and quickly tacks on; 'Same rules apply as going into a eating hall, which means no killing, etcetera. '

'You show great capacity of repeating yourself, Stark. We already have an agreement.'

'Can hardly blame me, can you? And that ice cream will melt in your pocket, Dancer, you either need to eat it or dump it.'

Loki looks adorably dismayed as he considers his options. 'I shall eat it.'

'Good to hear that,' Tony grins as he raps on the car partition for Happy to speed off. He's in such good spirits he almost wants to call Fury and crow _You see? _Alien races can be_ trained, _except you fellas go about it all _wrong_; all they require is the liberal application of alcohol and ice cream and a different way of looking at things.

Tony has it all figured out; he'll show the curious god all the pleasures of earthly living, of which Tony is a bleeding expert. Like an artist, he'll peel off gossamer layers of gastronomic delights, expose Loki to exhilarating excursions and breath-taking views.

It'd be _brilliant._

And even if he wasn't being strictly above line with the whole secrecy thing; _well,_ as long as Loki is with him, he couldn't be somewhere else, doing evil, homicidal Loki things. Par for the course.

And who knows, if Tony played his cards right the god of mischief might even grow to like earth enough to leave it alone.

**_~o0o0o~_**

_Or,_ maybe Tony's plan has some really _gaping_ holes.

'For the last time, 'cocktail' is not an insulting word, Loki. It's a type of _drink._'

There is the slightest of pauses before Loki grudging says, 'Perhaps.'

'And you _have_ to stop throwing me against a wall everything you hear something you don't like, ok?'

'I do not suffer to be ordered around by _kings_; much less a member of your species.'

'Even by _your_ books, Jingles, you'd only kill people if they genuinely offend you in some way.'

'Such is so.'

'Ergo: no offense given, no reason to die _today;_ and now would be a really good time to let me down.'

'Very well, Man of Iron.'

The elevator door opened just in time for Tony to pull his jacket back in place with a huff.

**_~o0o0o~_**


	6. Chapter 6

6

As it turns out Loki's favourite Migardian drink is the Olive Martini. As it _also_ turns out, when it comes to Olive Martinis, Loki can chug about seven adults under the table.

Tony can't imagine what the fate of the world would have been if he hadn't brought his credit cards. New York would probably be ashes at his feet.

After their very _minor_ altercation in the lift (although he should get his spine looked at tomorrow) Loki takes it upon himself to asks very pointed questions about life on earth – over and over again, and this is how Tony knows he will never, ever have children.

The night passes swiftly by as Tony attempts to identify and explain whatever catches Loki's attention – the purpose of a watch, Migardian dimensions of time, ice cubes, the theory of money, facial hair, gravity, etcetera.

Some phrases and words he encounters a bit of trouble of explaining, as Asgardians tended to have a fairly literal view of things. _Bookworm_, for example took a lot of explaining.

So did _cock_tails.

'Tis a true testament to the desecratory nature of humans to use such a graphic and repugnant word to describe something so clearly in need of a better term,' Loki complained, clutching his Olive Martini close to him as if he would protect its feelings. 'A _cocktail_ is precisely what I would call the Asgardian poison mine brother loves to swirl.'

'You know, you look like you want to take that cocktail to bed with you,' Tony laughs, throwing his head back in genuine mirth. 'Cheers, Reindeer Games. I'm sure James Bond would be proud to have his beverage choices approved by interstellar deities.'

'You seem to think I'd care one whit whom you lowly migardians choose to adulate.'

And Tony recalls with a sharp jab in his gut the god's mocking words in Germany. _Born to be ruled._ He pushes it away, deep into the inner recesses of his mind. It can wait for tomorrow. Next week. Next time. Another day, after the strange game they had been playing with each other ends, as it inevitably would.

'Would you like another one?' Tony asks instead as he takes the empty glass out of Loki's unresisting fingers. They were seated side by side on the rooftop of the Empire, with their backs against the crowd and the breeze in their faces. It was _nice_. The night glittered fiercely and the wind is_ just_ on this side of exhilarating; and Tony knows that cameras are clicking in the background somewhere but tonight he finds them remarkably easy to ignore.

But then with a god of mischief sitting beside you, everything else becomes easy to ignore.

Without the constant reminder of his mysterious circumstances (exile? banishment?) hanging around him like a miasma, Loki is friendly, almost chatty. And pretty good company. And sort of beautiful to look at, not that Tony peeks. Much.

Alright, he only looks because Tony's a normal guy; _mortal_ and _here_, and who the hell wouldn't if they found themselves in the twilight zone, entertaining alien gods on company expense accounts?

_'Stark.'_

'Yeah?'

'How does it feel to be so different from everyone else?'

Tony shrugs, deliberately misunderstanding the question. 'Guess I wasn't born with a comfort zone.'

'For a human who finds himself ventured so far afield from the safety of his herd, yes. You seem to be very comfortable with-' Loki seems to be trying out the word on his tongue; '_-difference_.'

'Could that be construed as a compliment? Because if it is, I'm going to call the New York Times and be insufferable, and then your reputation is _really_ going to suffer.'

Loki gave him a speculative look, which on the god's current human face vaults it from 'cunningly assessing' into 'downright creepy' territory.

'I mean to say you adapt well. A natural requirement of your species, but particularly advanced in your case. You do not seem to be particularly concerned that my presence might be unpopular- or that your shield mates might find themselves wroth-'

'_Wroth?_ Who writes your monologues? Ok, Thor probably used that word when he first arrived, but we sniggered it out of him a long time ago.'

Green eyes narrow. 'Would it _behove_ you to carry out a _single_ conversation with no mention of mine foul brethren?'

'Sorry, sorry. Just looking for things to relate to and you're the only two aliens I know. So listen, Jingles, I have a proposition for you.'

'Please. I'm _all_ ears.'

Tony takes a deep breath. Here goes nothing, or at least a quick, clean death.

'Ok Reindeer Games. The set-up is simple, and if you agree then we could play ball.'

_'Ball?'_

'Another non literal expression; a deal, an agreement to commence; a game.'

'A _game_ you say. And what would be the rules of this _game_, Man of Iron?'

He clears his throat. 'So I'm not going to ask why even though I really want to, Reeindeer Games, but here you are, back in the playground you blew half to smithereens not too long ago. And I assume you're going to stay awhile for the looks of it. I'm _also_ going to assume that you'd rather not have news of your presence here circulated, especially not to SHIELD. Whom I happen to work for, in a… round-about way. You get where I'm going with this?'

Loki's voice is as calm as the night. 'Are you attempting to threaten me, Stark?'

'What? No! No, what I want to do is offer you a... service. Let me show you America. Let me show you Olive Martinis and cheeseburgers and the statue of liberty and fifty different types of watermelons.'

'Watermelons,' Loki echoes, amused.

'The point I want to make, Jingles, is that there's a lot more to us than meets the eye. Let me show you _science_. Theatre. Deep see diving. The Hubble telescope. The ocean from an oil rig. If we run out of things in one country, there's always the next, and I'm the best person to show it to you. Nobody has to even know you're here, Jingles. But in return- in return, you can't deliberately go out and harm another human being. Not as long as our deal goes on, not as long as there's something you actually like about the little blue ball I come from, not as long as you like_anything_ of ours - and I see you plenty liking that martini. Not as long as our association continues- and not for three months after it ends.'

'I see. And if me and mine are offended or attacked?'

'You can defend yourself, and not beyond that. Come on, Jingles, what have you got to lose? You're here, you're stuck, you might as well not be bored. So I'll show you earth. Everything she has to offer. All the trimmings, and over and above the normal duty of care.'

'Mmm. I _am_ bored, and it _is_ tempting.'

'All the Olive Martini you can guzzle down, and then some.'

'You think to sufficiently hold my interest over time with a few _drinks?'_

'Of course not, Jingles.' Tony paused. 'I intend to hold your interest with _me_.'

Green eyes danced, took in his measure with lighting quick feet.

'With such heart-stopping arrogance, one would mistake you for being born a god.'

'Good thing my heart's Stark Re-enforced and improved upon.'

'Hmm. I assume you have restrictions for me.'

'The parameters are simple. No scheming-no violence-no dead people. No sudden display of coloured electricity over the big apple because you suddenly feel like a human barbeque.'

'Do you take me for an fool? I would not waste my magic suffering the deaths of punny mortals, Man of Iron.'

'Fabul-'

'-not unless _you_ offended me first.'

And _wow_ but that's a _great_ way to put a guy on the spot.

Tony choked down his drink. 'Yeah about _that._ I was hoping we could talk about it first. Blow some steam of before blowing buildings up? America's excessively fond of hotlines; I bet if we look hard enough we'll find one for evil overlords.'

Loki simply gazes at the skyline for long minutes, leaving Tony to stew in discomfort whilst he idly examines the streets below.

'Know this, Man of Iron,' he finally says. 'Migard is a polluted world. Its humans eke out a shallow, temporal life of greed and desperation, before falling to dissolution and disease. Your world's fate is inevitable destruction. You can delay it, but you cannot circumvent it.'

'You would have made an awesome gothic poet, Dancer.'

The god shifts even closer, until they faces all but touched, and Tony tries not to flinch at the leer curving sour and toxic on the god of lies. 'You are but a mortal, Man of Iron and will not comprehend. But out of mine own favourable eye, I will reveal to you knowledge sacred beyond your merit: Migard will fall, now or eventually. When and how, is of no concern to me. I care for the inhabitants of this world as much as I care for JØottenheimr or Múspel, and they can grace the halls of Hel for all I care. 'You however-'

'You are _worthy_ my attention,' he says, and there's this _fascination_ is his eyes, as if he wants to tear Tony's human soul out looking for the source of his amusement and devour or attempt to reassemble it like lego, and Tony is truly starting to cotton onto the fact that all said and done, the god of mischief is _nonhuman._

And Loki has never been so scary because Tony can _hear_ within his own soul some awful form of truthf hidden in the god's lies - a message of subliminal cosmic level which he scare can understand; like a wind that wears down a mountain, or a crack that swallows the sea.

He can hear it, like an invisible chime; like a flicker of the future, burning the flesh off his eyelids - yet at the same time a pain that never existed, a pain he never felt.

Tony can hear it, but he cannot understand it, and as he looks into Loki's eyes with its false cornflower hues, he realizes that Loki knows this.

Instead the human does the only thing he can; he laughs, hard and long, emptying his lungs of acid air.

'You wouldn't happen to be half-entomologist, would you? No butterfly nets and giant pins? Cos I wouldn't be half as entertaining to you as part of a Nine Realms collectible edition.'

'What use would you be to me dead?' the god of mischief shook his head, as if explaining a simple fact to a child. 'I shall see you in your element, Man of Iron, because it amuses me, and- as you say, it is better to have one such as yourself to initiate me to the manifold merits of - migardian cocktails.'

Tony clears his throat. 'So is that a _yes_ I hear?'

Again the god of mischief does not answer, seeming to be content to let the silence drift between them. Tony is in turn intrigued by his own lack of boredom – usually a lull in conversation will have him scrambling for the Starkphone or checking out the competition.

So far he's been ensconced for four hours here in the balcony, and he's yet to turn around.

The god of mischief suddenly straightens and turns the full impact of his intense gaze upon him.

'Seeing that I'm stuck here for the foreseeable future, I _might_ as well sample the offerings.' Loki says this in a voice that might have been mistaken for flirting – that is, if Loki had been a sharp knife and Tony had been a watermelon. 'Very well, Stark. I agree to your terms. And we shall play of your ball in this game together.'

Tony blinks, chokes and coughs, in that order. Then he takes a few seconds more to club to death his hard-wired reflex to double entendre before straightening out to reply.

'I was hoping you'd say that.'

The smile the god of mischief gives him is almost warm but also slightly dangerous, and Tony swallows and realizes a little short of_ too-fucking-late_ that he doesn't really have a plan yet. He's just planning to never get caught, ever.

'Whilst I can't complain about the state of migard's drinks, Man of Iron, you're going to have to do better than that on the dinning front.'

'Oh that? Naww, that really wasn't my kind of scene as well. If I thought we could get away with it we'd be at a cheeseburger joint.'

'What do you put into a cheeseburger?'

And that is how Tony ended up agreeing to play the culinary tour-guide to Asgard's god of mischief.

**_~o0o0o~_**

'Where the _hell_ have you been, Stark?'

_Shit._ Busted.

Tony raises his arms above his head. 'I'm unarmed, and I'm going to slowly turn around. Don't shoot me.'

Clint is leaning against the wall, tsking in his usual mocking manner. 'Bad Tony. You missed two SHIELD meetings. We should haul your ass down to Fury right now, boy.'

'Pepper has been calling for days,' Nat informs him without inflection.

'Has she? Must have left the company cell phone behind.'

Natasha walks up to him, her cool, assessing eyes missing nothing. 'We don't want to know what you're up to, but its Steve's birthday in _two_days, so you'd better not forget again.'

'Now we both know that's not fair Nat, I _was_ in the midst of being incarcerated by an evil district court judge that last time. Besides, it only happened once.'

'You better not turn up hung-over or being chased by angry one-night stands either.'

'That happened _once too_,' Tony protested. 'Ok, less than five times. But I swear to all that's holy, I'm not going to miss this one. Come on, I wouldn't miss Cap's birthday for the world.'

'Wednesday, Stark,' Clint throws over his shoulder as Tony watches The Shining twins walk away; '-and you're paying for the ice cream we ordered.'

'All three hundred flavours,' Nat smiles her scary smile before disappearing around the corner.

Alone, Tony expels a sour breath as his heart finally feels safe enough to start beating again.

'I consider myself duly warned.'

**_~o0o0o~_**


	7. Chapter 7

7

Introducing Loki to earth is like trying to impress a cat with a ball of yarn – a jungle cat, that is. You draw as close as you dare and spin out your yarn, carefully gauging the bright cat eyes and deceptive pose that give nothing away of its true feelings - and tell yourself you're fast enough to draw your hand away if it tries to bite you.

The problem is you never really know, can't really tell if said cat is going to find your ball of yarn as engaging from one day to the next. You'll never know if it seeks you out because it enjoys your company, or out of boredom, or simply to bid it's time to remove an eyeball so it could play with_ that_ instead.

Turns out he's a cat person. How 'bout that.

But then Tony's favourite breed of dog has always been Rottweiler.

**_~o0o0o~_**

'-because I still prefer the purple, and it does _not_ taste the same.'

'You just_ want_ them to be different. All dragonfruit taste the same regardless of colour: they taste _bland_.'

'Your taste buds are a thing of tragedy, Man of Iron.'

'I have a name you know, and it's a lot easier to say than Man of Iron,' Tony grumbles at his houseguest over the sizzling of the grill.

'I shall call you _what_ I deem suitable_ when_ I deem suitable.'

'I'm slaving over a hot stove for you here.'

'Considering that my preferred choice is 'squirming mortal worm-'

'Shucks, I bet you say that to all the pretty girls.'

'-one might say you'd already raised a sight higher in my regard than the vast majority of your species.'

'What's wrong wit-'

Loki waves a negligent hand, cutting him off. 'I shall tolerate your impatience this time, short-lived migardian, but let things take their course. We shall see what I call you when the time comes.'

'I think you brother said the same thing,' Tony smugly informs him, 'which makes you more alike in deed and stubbornness than you'd care to admit.'

Loki looks at him with dangerous eyes. 'I do not smite you where you stand, _Tony Stark_, only because you are presently engaged in the service of cooking me a cheeseburger.'

'Saved by the salami,' Tony grins.

'You are infantile,' Loki grouses, 'and far too enamoured of yourself.'

'Hullo, Kettle, _nice_ to meet you too. And I happen to have the perfect excuse for my self-confidence, let me tell you; it's all becaus-'

'Because of you're surrounded by sycophants? '

'Because I'm Tonk Stark, and I'm _masterful _at this,' Tony crows as he tips patty over bun and hustles up the remaining condiments. 'Make way for my masterpiece: one cheeseburger a 'la Tony with the works.'

With a florish, the billionaire pushes the plate on which his juicy, perfect creation sat to the god of mischief. 'I tripled the cheese and onions in your honour m'lord. Dig in whilst its hot.'

'Hmm.'

His euphoria quickly dissipates when Loki continues to stare at it.

'Well?'

A knot makes its way onto the god's smooth forehead. 'It has an evil scent.'

'An evil _what_?'

Loki's expression as he regards the cheeseburger can only be interpreted as hostile.

'It looks like a dish made for revenge. '

'_Cheeseburgers_ look evil? Oh. That's rich, Rudolph, considering the kind of _gear_ you tote.'

'This is the appropriate look of something I would watch mine enemies eat when I force the charred flesh of their loved ones down their throats. I shall keep this idea for the future, Stark. You have my gratitude.'

Loki must be joking. Of course he's joking. Right? _Right?_

'Soooo, maybe a slightly less _disgusting_ topic for the table- '

'Only the very base would fall with vigour upon the carcasses of dead animals and call it a feast,' Loki says fastidiously. 'Buffoons such as mine brother, for instance.'

Thus did Tony Stark come to discovers that the god of mischief is not overly found of meat because his_ brother _loves it. Colour him surprised.

'Gwash, Reindeer Games, _could_ you take that sibling rivalry any further?'

'Be careful there, Stark.'

Tony clears his throat. Alcohol. How could he forget that twelve o'clock is the_ perfect_ time for Olive Martinis – if only he - where _did_ he last see that jar of olives?

'Could have told me earlier that your inclination leaned towards goat-feed, oh devious one.'

'The senses on your tongue will not sharpen on a piece of dead flesh, Man of Iron.'

'Gross, Silvertongue, I'll have you know that this is 100% kobe beef steak.'

'You just_ want_ them to be different. All dead flesh taste the same; of putrefaction.'

'Oh clever, right back at me. I think my eyebrows just got singed off. You know we have a saying here; don't bite the hand that feeds you, cos the hand that feeds you hangs on to the Olive Martinis-'

_'Feeds-'_ Loki's face grow from outrage to all-out crazed and it occurs to Tony that maybe he could have phrased it better. 'You dare infer- you_condescend_ to put me in the same-'

'Now, Reindeer Games, you do know I meant that in the_ best_ sense.'

'I would do more than _bite_ such a hand, Man of Iron, I would pulverise it, I would subject each exposed _nerve_ to the most exquisite levels of_pain_-'

'Classy. Do you people _really_ speak like that on to each other on Asguard?'

And batshit-crazy Loki, ever mercurial, changes gears as fast as Tony does, because he suddenly grins.

'You should meet the Allfather, to whom in such things I am but a lamb at his knee.'

'You're _shitting_ me.'

'Is this yet another one of your senseless migardian expressions?'

'Yes, and the reply to this would be to say I shit you not.'

'Well then, Tony Stark. Loki Laufeyson _shits you not.'_

In response Tony waves a bottle of gin and a jar of olives at the god of mischief and grins.

'I hereby challenge you to the best daddy-o impersonations, Dancer. Best out of five wins.'

**_~o0o0o~_**

They ended up sharing the same cheeseburger from Loki's plate; or rather, Tony watches the god lifting tiny pieces of bun, onion and lettuces from the desecrated remains of Tony's work of art and leaving him to finish the meat, cheese and pickles.

Tony's not about to complain. In fact, he can barely keep from grinning.

Of course, he's also heroically _not_ noticing certain things about the whole intimacy of their setting that normal _Migardians_ would take as a sign of very _bad_ things about to happen.

Because Loki is not Migardian. Yeah. So no need to read into anything. Nothing. Nada.

Zilch.

Loki eats with his fingers as if he's eating something exotic and sensory like sushi or rice pilaf, very slowly and with no embarrassment of his own deliberateness. Watching him Tony can easily imagine how his every mannerism must stand out in a 'dining hall' like Asgard because he's seen Thor eat, and Thor falls upon food like a starving wolf; and dinner with Thor consists of raised voices and slamming tankards on the table (he broke a dozen mugs alone in his first week in Stark Tower) and grabbing one's shield brothers for an affectionate pummelling.

Tony cannot imagine Loki ever subjecting himself to an affectionate pummelling.

Thor had preferred to use his fingers too (even for steaks and pasta, until a long-suffering Natasha finally took it upon herself to teach him mysterious ways of cutlery), but this is where their similarities end. Loki falls silent when eating, becoming almost unapproachable. If not for the countless martinis Tony has been quietly foisting upon him, conversation would have grounded to a halt.

But Tony thinks that he has a small insight now to the boy that Loki must have been, the prickly shell he must have found necessary to grow to protect him for the daily rituals of dinner.

And it is in this small surprising way that Loki reminds him of Bruce, though both would not be pleased at the comparison.

**_~o0o0o~_**

Loki's Olive Martinis had as much olives as gin. Maybe more.

'You finished my olives,' Tony said reproachfully with his hand around the empty jar.

'Imprecise humans. How do you call it an _Olive_ Martini and put only one olive in?'

'That makes no sen- actually that does make sense. You know what? We should call up the American Bartending Association and register an official foul.'

'You do that, Man of Iron.'

'I shall. The justice of olives must be served!'

'But of course.'

**_~o0o0o~_**

Because Tony is so goddamn drunk, he doesn't mind being honest for once.

'So I had a good time today. Who'd thought cavorting with you would be so much fun, Jingles.'

'Imagine my _utter_ delight,' Loki informs him with an almost perfectly straight face, 'to be the source of yours.'

Tony nods graciously, swaying a little. It was no secret his devilishly charming self is the scourge of east coast virgins and- other things.

'So, iF you're not torturing anyone or making things explode tomorrow, I happen to be in possession of a lot of ice cream from five o'clock onwards.'

Loki sniffs. 'Will there be watermelon?'

'Baby, there'll be three types of melon. At least. Its Cap's birthday, and he has an ice cream fetish he thinks we know nothing about. '

'I shall consider your invitation most thoroughly, Man of Iron.'

Tony frowns at this. What's there to consider? 'Alright, Dancer, I'll meet you at my manly hiding hole – at Calatrava Tower.'

Loki opens his mouth, ostensibly to protest, and after an interminable minute replies with a very polite, 'Very well, Stark.'

'Ok. Good.'

'Yes.'

He's staring, he knows. And Loki is staring right back.

'Excellent.'

'Yes.'

Aaaaand Tony is experiencing his very first bout of Ackward 101 _right now. _ Nice. Obviously the universe thinks he's finally ready to handle it, at the ripe old age of thirty eight.

'Soooo. I'll go now, before I'm dissed. Because I'm pissed. Before I'm missed.'

_'Please_ don't let me hold you,' the god mummers modestly.

'Kaaay goodbyes.'

Door. _Walk_, Stark, don't stumble.

But he's Tony Stark, so he can't resist turning around at the door one last time. 'Tomorrow at sich. At six. Don't be late.'

And the billionaire almost but not quite misses Loki's near inaudible reply.

'Oh, I wouldn't miss it for the _world.'_

**_~o0o0o~_**


	8. Chapter 8

8

To be fair, it wasn't really an ice-cream birthday party so much as an ice-cream birthday free for all; one which poor Steve didn't even end up staring in much as he should have (aside from the part where they sing the song and blow the candles) because Tony is an attention whore and Clint is just a whore.

The plan had been to have Natasha and Pepper as the task force appointed to occupy Steve, who would be putty in the hands of two suddenly hapless ladies who required help assembling Pepper's new surround sound in her apartment downtown.

Left to their own devices, (with very firm warnings from Pepper) the remaining Avengers had quickly gathered to compare blueprints for building the ice cream cake. Except they'd all expected _somebody else_ to come up with said blueprints, the result being three slightly embarrassed grown men standing amongst twenty-odd cartons of ice cream, with more on the way and the ingrained fear of Pepper playing out violent little fantasy reels in their heads.

As usual, it falls upon Tony to take change, because Bruce looks as if he's one yogurt pot away from hulking out and Clint hasn't stopped twitching in the last six minutes.

'Guys! Guys, we're _fine_. The girls are gone and we have an hour to do this, and most important of all, we have my_ brain_ working for us.' He gaze sweeps the floor, making rapid calculations with his brilliant mind. 'Here's how we're going to split the job. Bruce can do the heavy lifting, I'll direct, and Clint can say '_yes master'_ a lot and keep an eye on the door.'

'Why am I always Igor?' Clint mutters mutinously. 'Every goddamn time I'm Igor.'

'Tell me again why we didn't just buy an ice cream cake.'

'Because Steve likes ice-cream, Bruce, not ice-cream _cake._ There's a world of difference.'

Bruce is rubbing the bridge of his nose. 'Tell me why we didn't just commission one, then.'

'Because everybody wrote down what flavours they wanted and by the time we compiled that, it was sixteen pages long. And that's _after_ taking off Thor's really weird requests, like banana-bacon and mattress stuffing.'

The physicist sighs. 'It wouldn't have fit through the door anyways.'

They end up standing around and arguing too much so Tony decides to take a page from Loki and wave magic snappy fingers at them. 'Go off now and meet me back in the kitchen with that fuck-tonne of ice-cream building materials.'

Interestingly it worked, albeit with a great deal of muttering behind Tony's back. But still. Maybe Loki is on to something after all.

They proceed to create the tower by mashing ice-cream into small round buckets and upending the containers on each other, stack by stack. Unfortunately, Bruce's suggestion of making it ziggurat-shaped was vetoed by Tony's idea of making it slim and cylindrical like a tower (more pointedly, like _Stark_ Tower) which ultimately resulted in the cake's resemblance to the leaning tower of piza once the candles had been lit, and then collapsing completely midway through the birthday song.

The initial idea had also been to stick to blueberry, strawberry and vanilla for the colours, but they quickly ran out, and after a while the tower starts looking as if a hundred birds had made colourful, technicolor bird-poos on it.

Tony's not worried about artistic interpretation however, because he can always blame Clint.

Clint is tasked to decorate the hall, but his half-hearted attempts and incurable bird-like curiosity results in him spending most of his time in the kitchen with Bruce and Tony, making unhelpful comments and stumbling over empty cartons.

They hit a wall when Clint takes out the candles.

'Guys. How many candles do we put on the cake for Cap?'

'I don't know,' Bruce shrugs.

'Whatever the answer, you won't have enough candles, Clint. Just stick a big one in for every decade,' Tony says distractedly, trying to remove the blobs of cold slush tricking down his neck.

'And how many is _that?'_

'Does the year's he's been asleep count?'

'Nein, for then we'll need ninety candles.'

'I suppose we could always make the cake_ taller.'_

Tony decides to leave them to it, and spends his time bitterly complaining about the freezing temperature JARVIS has readjusted the living space to and looking surreptitiously around for melon flavoured gelato.

**_~o0o0o~_**

The party begins when Steve walks in to a freezing hallway, spots his half-hung birthday banner dangling forlornly between ceiling fan and floor and virtually no surface left on the floor for walking on account of the hundred-odd tubs lying around.

_'Surprise!'_

It's amazing how fast Steve turns red when showered with attention. 'You guys are amazing.'

'Tony made the banner,' Clint chirps unhelpfully. It reads 'Every Birthday Needs Strippers' and had a picture of a pin up girl strategically holding onto a shield.

'Where the hell did you find 289 flavours?' Steve boggles. 'Even Baskin Robbins has only 31.'

'I mixed up a bunch of stuff from the lab.' Bruce informs him with a perfectly straight face. 'If some of them start turning green, don't eat it.'

'This is the best birthday of my _life,' _Steve says tearfully, and Tony can barely resist rolling his eyes.

Aside from the insane cold, it turns out to be a really spiffy party, one that _really_ picked itself up after Tony takes it upon himself to fill all the half-eaten tubs with liquor. He has an appointment he doesn't want to miss and his band of merry men didn't look like they were about to tire out anytime soon, so… a good deed done and everyone happy and Tony gets to leave by five, because he's brilliant and efficient that way.

Even Pepper behaves herself. Aside from an aggrieved expression and a vaguely threatening 'we'll talk later' to Tony, she mostly forgets about work and gives herself over to an afternoon off. The only let down is Thor, who had made a special effort to return to earth in time for Steve's party; and then proceeded to frown throughout it. Beyond the first cursory greeting, Tony avoids him. He has a feeling he doesn't want to know.

**_~o0o0o~_**

'And what the hell flavour is this? Osmanthus – well I never – eeeew, this smells like Nat's perfume when she goes undercover as a cheap courtesan-'

The Black Widow arches an eyebrow. 'How would _you_ like to smell of the insides of a toilet as I pull the flush.'

Clint brandishes the carton threateningly. 'Stay back, Nat! I'm armed with flower-power and I'm not afraid to us-ooof-'

'Hey if you aren't eating the flower ones I'll take it,' Tony hollers over the pair. 'And gimme all the melon ones too.'

'Tony? Since when did you go for eau de fruity-flora bouquet?'

'Yeah Tin Can, if this is an attempt to deal with your BO, you can't eat your way to a sweeter smelling bod.'

'Actually as it happens, you can.' Bruce informs them. 'There are studies out that that say vegetarians are judged more sexually attractive by scent alone.'

'My body smells just fine.' Tony says, making an extravagant show of sniffing himself. 'Smells just like Tony Stark, hunk o' glorious manly flesh.'

'Litmus test! Let me smell your armpits-'

'Fly away now, little bird. Mama's calling.'

'With a kitchen knife,' the Russian redhead murmurs.

_'No violence_ on off-days,' Steve chants his usual reminders. Poor Steve, playing mummy even on his birthday.

After OD-ing on too many flavours they spent the remaining afternoon making little snow-cream figures of the Avengers, although Clint recieves a well-deserved whack when he gives Natasha little ice-cream boobs.

'You have no sense of proportion or taste, Clint.' Tony tsks. 'Tasha's snowman shouldn't look like that.'

'Dam straight.'

'Her chest should be _much_ bigger. Here Bruce, _you_ do it.'

'I'll need a bigger spoon,' Bruce says critically.

Only Tony's (recently much utilised) reflexes save him from a face full of cold pink sludge.

Steve, as is his wont, laughs at everything and makes fun of nothing. And it is Steve of course with his incurable Labrador's instinct for saving grannies and cheering up 5th graders who also takes it upon himself to draw Thor out of his funk.

'Nay, for I am in poor spirits and would not prevail mine worries upon my shield brothers on such a day,' said Thor, who'd probably thought himself terribly subtle as he brooded in the corner of the television room endlessly stirring his pot of vanilla macadamia fudge.

'Are you sure, Thor?'

'It's Cap's birthday, big guy, you _can't _refuse the _birthday _boy if he asks you something.'

Thor looks troubled at that, but he looks even more torn about sharing, and the resulting expressions of hangdog bewilderment that chases across his face makes everyone uncomfortable.

'Friends, I needs make a grievous confession to you about the reason of mine extended absence.'

Tony shoots up like a rocket. '_Guys_ guys, its Stevie's birthday party! Why don't we _leave _the work stuff for tomorrow-'

Thro continues as if he hadn't heard Tony. 'Long had I fought the Allfather's judgement to no avail, and it is with a heavy heart that I bear to you the gravest ne-'

'Come_on_ people, its Sunday!' Tony yells, and then flips the bird at Bruce. 'Don't shush me. _You_ shush!'

'Loki is back on migard.' Thor announces grimly.

And then all hell breaks loose.

**_~o0o0o~_**

'-but that is not the problem. I know mine brother is most remorseful of his hand in recent events-'

'We're talking about _Loki,_ Thor. Remorseful is not a word I'd lay within a hundred mile radius of 'Thoughts Loki Laufeyson would ever have in this life'.

'His name is Loki _Odin_son, for he is still and will always be mine baby brother,' Thor frowns. 'But you speak truth, son of Banner, for upon returning to migard I had not made my way here immediately but had gone off in search of mine brother, that I may see with mine own eyes that he is safe and causing no new mischief.' He broke off and shook his shaggy head like a great bear. 'And when I found him, I could _not _believe what I chanced upon.'

Tony clears his throat, unconscious of drawing Natasha's sharp eyes. 'And what did you see?'

'He was-'

'What? _What?'_

Thor actually turns away, looking beyond distressed.

'He was _drinking_. I saw mine brother holding on to a bottle of Miguardian mead.'

'_Urm.'_

'What- Why would this be such a concern, big guy?'

'Verily I am afraid for what he might do, for my brother has never taken to drink,' Thor frets, looking very much like some character in a Shakespeare play about to reveal a game-changing secret. 'To do so at such a point in his life and all alone; I fear it might awaken in him an aggression or grief that pours yet more mischief upon the world.'

'Did you- did you approach him?' Steve asks grimly.

'Nay, for I think he sensed mine presence and teleported away before I could reach him.'

'We have to inform Fury about this,' Natasha coolly points out.

As for Tony, he's just trying very hard not to choke.

'I shall have to find Loki again.' Thor said earnestly. 'I must find out what could have driven him to such low extremities as to resort to migardian drinking methods-'

'Could it be because your alien stuff tastes like piss?'

Five heads shrivels towards him, and Tony freezes.

'Hey. I'm just throwing it out there.'

**_~o0o0o~_**


	9. Chapter 9

9

Considering whom he is and how he spends a vast majority of his free time, Tony is aware he's taken a _remarkably _long time to grasp his own attraction to Loki.

It's a bit of a let-down actually. Here stands Tony Stark, god's gift to anyone with a libido and he's always pride himself on his ability to appreciate the pleasures of the flesh (horse, supermodels, alien gods), so being taken by surprise like this is a blow to his pride.

Tony Stark is _never_ taken by surprise when it comes to sexual attraction.

Which is why it _stings_, to turn up at his manly hiding hole in Calatrava Tower at six pm for round two of his private ice cream party with Loki, only to find the carpet pulled out from under his feet when he encounters the god of mischief coming out of his bedroom wearing nothing but one of Tony's pinstriped robes.

And Tony gets to watch a stray bead of water slick off impossibly black hair to trickle down an impossibly white throat before disappearing into_his_ pinstriped robe; and this simply cannot _be borne_, because that's _his_ pinstripe robe Loki is wearing and Tony should-

Tony should take a shower. A cold one.

'Did you just- did you just come out of my _bedroom_?'

'Where else would one immerse oneself in water for the purpose of _cleaning_, Man of Iron?'

'Oh I don't know, one of the other _four_ ensuite bedrooms?'

'Then perhaps the question should be,' Loki drawls, '-where else would I do so in the biggest bathing space _available_.'

_'Ah.'_

And Tony backs off because he can't think of anything else to say, not with Loki + bathrobe standing right in front of him.

(Hang on; the _robe Loki wore_. _Where_ is that robe, he must retrieve it for safekeeping before the cleaning service _gets_ to it—)

The god of mischief apparently, cares not a whit for his state of undress or the vulnerable exterior he presents (to have an entire garment so easily undone by a careless knot; its lapels part so readily to every movement!) He prowls around Tony's apartment as if he owns it; in fact he prowls around Tony himself as if examining the seemliness of Tony's ice cream offering.

'It is common in Asgard for men to share each other's space and partake of showers together. I'm surprised Thor hasn't inducted you yet to this favourite pastime of his. Or barge into one of yours, as he usually does back in Asgard.'

Tony chokes back a cough. 'Pervy.'

'I didn't know you had such_ girlish_ sensibilities, Man of Iron. Never mind then.'

_'Girlish_- I don't mind! Of course I don't mind. Do I look like I _mind!?'_

**_~o0o0o~_**

Tony scores with his flora bouquet of ice-cream, because Loki takes to them like a skunk to sweet-smelling meadows. The mint, lavender and osmantheus flavours are devoured in short order. It starts out a little awkwardly, because Loki hadn't known that ice cream is supposed to be enjoyed with _utensils _unless it came on a stick or cone_. _Hence a good fifteen minutes of subjecting Tony to the horror show of having to watch him suck ice cream off his fingers before the billionaire finally found the voice (and courage) to pass him a spoon.

The god of mischief is too blissed out by the cold flavours however, to take notice of his offensive imposition or rude bulgy-eyed stares, so Tony escapes with limbs intact and spends most of his time drooling into his mocha raspberry swirl.

The watermelon is left for last, and Loki actually makes little growly noises when his spoon starts scrapping at the rounded corners of the carton and coming out empty, which makes Tony fantasise wonder how far Loki would follow a trail of watermelon desserts if he ever laid one out.

He finds the idea worth keeping aside. As, you know, distraction tactic in times of war. Yeah.

'You're disgusting, Reindeer Games. Your food choices are an embarrassment to Asgard, all nine realms and the universe.'

Loki ignores him in favour of licking the spoon clean.

'You left the chocolate ones untouched.'

'No.'

'At least_ try_ the chocolate. How could anyone _not_ like chocolate?'

But Loki stubbornly scorns the chocolate and vanilla, and looks downright derisive when Tony persuades him to give Butterscotch a chance. Sprinkles and chocolate sauce are similarly scorned in favour of the cool, clean taste of nata de coco and other weird tasteless jelly-things that makes Tony roll his eyes.

'I suppose it's a good way to get your daily serving of fruits and vegetables.'

Loki chases away the last bits of ice cream from his spoon with a very pink tongue, unheeding of his bad manners. 'This repast has been most pleasing, Stark. I should like to experience such ice-cream meal again tomorrow.'

Tony's not so sure he _can_. Actually he's not sure if he'll make it past the current one.

'Ice cream is a dessert, Dancer. Before that comes what we earthlings call an actual _meal._'

_'No_ meat then,' is all the god of mischief says.

'You want me to stop meating you?' Tony grins. 'Come on, give it a chance before you decide.'

Loki laughs, rare and involuntary and strangely endearing, and this makes Tony flush like a girl feel a manly sort of bonding thing going on in his chest, because that's what happens when people have a good time together. Yes, it's exactly that. Just like when he hangs out with Steve and Bruce with the X-Box and and some beers and they get into some serious bromance action.

And if he doesn't stare surreptitiously at their moving lips like he does Loki, or feel a tremble under the pad of his fingertips the way he does now – well, it just means the god of mischief has a little more charisma about him, that's all. Some sort of… serious alien mojo, to be able to hang on to Tony's attention span for so long.

He's not sure if that's good, or very, very bad. Probably very bad, because Tony would love to blame it on the whole novelty-of-outer-space thing; if only there wasn't another alien deity brother already living under his roof.

To be honest, he really shouldn't be surprised by the tension between them, but he _is. _And this makes him terrified, because he's never had to think about acting on his impulses before.

There's no way he should even be _having_ an impulse in the first place.

(And _who's_ been eating my ice-cream, says papa bear)

Except there's this one moment, when Loki had been distracted by a tub of Lavender ice cream and Tony had made some excuse to go to the bathroom because he could only take so much of watching a grown man lick stuff off a spoon – and there's this one moment, one particular moment where he walks into the master bedroom of Calatrava Tower as if an invisible force is pulling him there-

(And _who's_ been wearing my robe, says mama bear)

Like a sleepwalker, Tony goes up to the bed; up to the white sheets that are crumpled around the edges, up to the tousled bedding and the quilt partially lying on the floor- recently used. Tousled. Slept upon. And his brains _burns._

(And _who's_ been sleeping in my bed, says Tony bear, who's _still_ going to sleep in my bed tonight)

But if his eyes happen to widen and his face flush, well, there's no witness here to see it. And if some of the thoughts in his head are starting to betray everyone he loves and everything he stands for and fights for – well. They'd never get him to admit them.

(Black hair on white skin; black boots on white sheets, and there's a part of Tony that already knows that he's doomed.)

**_~o0o0o~_**


	10. Chapter 10

10

And thus Loki's gastronomic journey on earth continues apace, and Tony's induction into the trials of self-denial (late in life as it comes) continues.

Loki likes anything that smells or tastes like it came out of a haystack, or a meadow of flowers, or the peak of a mountain. He loves best the flesh of young coconuts and paper-thin slices of cucumber, zucchini or melons: anything really, with a pure, clean taste.

He can generally be prevailed upon to try anything once if it was cold enough. Aspic becomes a regular at mealtimes, and he eats the hard boiled eggs that Tony stuffs in the freezer and pronounces them perfect.

He drinks iced mint tea and olive martinis by the litres. Occasionally he tolerates crepes, especially if elderflower syrup is present. All of Tony's attempts at introducing that great American meal, the take out; is met with cold indifference. They've argued over the individual merits of the sixteen different breeds of apples that Tony ordered online, and the jury is still out on avocados.

By the time another week flies past, Tony is keeping a zero-errors record that he's privately rather smug about.

By far his most astounding success is with sushi. Sashimi in particular, which Tony counts as a major win because god, there's only so much_vegetarian_ he can take, so he spends a great deal of time on the internet reading up on restaurant reviews.

Once as a gag, he'd taken Loki to restaurant whose cuisine had been highlighted by a number of reviewers as 'a passage in perfecting the taste of cardboard'. It's something he's lived to regret, because this place is now their default lunch joint unless Tony finds something spiffier – by Loki standards, that is.

Some of his experiments didn't turn out so well. Like the time Tony tries to introduce coffee to Loki, and almost got thrown out of the window again. (If Loki wasn't alien, he'd be British). Or the first time he persuaded him to try Chinese take-out.

'Are you trying to poison me?' the god had hissed, backing away from the tiny white carton as if it contained Asgardian kryptonite.

'Death by Chow Mien? There are faster ways to try to kill an enemy, don't you think?'

So in the end Tony had foisted Chow Mien and Sweet and Sour Pork on Thor, who of course declared it the most delicious migardian thing bar none, and subsequently insisted on Chinese take-out every time it was his turn to decide on dinner.

Steve still hasn't forgiven him for that.

The biggest _surprise_ however, is the oysters. By the time introducing shellfish and molluscs to Loki had come around Tony has managed to lay down a sizable impressions of Loki's taste buds and how to manipulate the god (Loki being surprisingly pliable when it comes to food bribes), but the oysters throws him. There's nothing remotely_ clean_ about the taste of oysters.

Needless to say, the oysters irritate Tony a great deal.

**_~o0o0o~_**

Loki's subsequent obsession with oysters was something they argued about again and again, as Tony accepts none of the god's explanation as to why they fall into the same category as all the other dull, tasteless things he favours. Oysters are fishy and phlegmy with a coppery after-taste; they cannot by any stretch of the imagination be described as feeling 'clean'.

And thus did Asgard's god of mischief sigh untold times into his tuna belly chirashi-sushi as Tony raises yet another completelyvalid point about oyster pungency.

'You are overly concerned with categories, Man of Iron.'

_'Tony.'_

'You _do_ appreciate the taste of this strangely shaped creature, do you not? In this we have an accord.'

'Yes, but it doesn't _taste_ clean,' Tony complained. 'Oysters eat dirt and_ shit_.'

'I really don't care,' the god of mischief retorts as he picks up a piece of paper-thin gari with slender bamboo chopsticks, as if he'd been using them his whole life.

'Here, Dancer. Behold the wisdom of _Wikipedia_. Oysters are filter feeders; do you know what that means? It means filter _fish shit_ int– hey!'

His phone flys out of his grasp and into Loki's open palm, as if magnetised.

'I thought we had a deal – no magic.'

'Nobody's dying from your talking but _me_, Stark,' Loki huffs and proceeds to scan through the article, chopsticks jabbing the air. 'Oysters filter fifty gallons of liquid a day. They take on the flavour of the water they are harvested in, the content of the ocean. Oysters taste of your migardian_oceans,_ Man of Iron. They do not taste of _faeces_, unless you have some experience you'd like to share about how you came by this knowledge.'

Tony is about to argue, but a thought strikes him. 'Fifty galleons huh. Suppose we kept them in a champagne tank.'

The god of mischief lobbs his phone back at him with a long-suffering expression. 'This conversation is at an end, Stark.'

'_Tony._ And I bet _you_ could keep a bunch of oysters alive with some of that magic alien thingamajigs.'

Loki blinks owlishly, sushi forgotten. 'You wish me to assist you in creating alcoholic _oysters_.'

Brains salivating at the possibilities; Tony shifts into persuasive mode. 'Think of it as a scientific experiment. You like to defy the laws of nature, do you not? What could possibly be more defiled than keeping shit-eating oysters in a giant vat of champagne?'

The god's mouth quirks. 'What indeed. And in return, what am I to expect?'

'My eternal gratitude and friendship?' Tony palavers with a devilish grin, and then spilt hot ocha on his suit on when Loki replies.

'We shall see what that is worth, then, _Anthony.'_

**_~o0o0o~_**

Tony remembers watching Jurassic Park as a kid.

He remembers the exhilaration of imagining how it feels to have a forty feet dinosaur thunder past you whilst hiding in a bush or playing dead. The sense of wonder it entails, to observe these creatures in their natural habitat, knowing you were the first human to do so, maybe the only human who ever will.

And somewhere along the years all these fantasies and their memories must have crossed wires and short-circuited, turning Tony into the sort of guy who now enjoys having a dangerous animal in close proximity, thrilled to observe his subjects in its 'natural habitat' and never quite knowing if he is going to be part of its next meal.

_However._

Movies like Jurrasic Park never told him what to do if the hero was simultaneously attracted to the T-Rex.

It doesn't tell him what to do with alien gods with smiles like scimitars and words as sharp as lies.

It doesn't tell him how to handle the way the pulse in his throat goes haywire they're sitting in some sushi bar, side by side and deceptively intimate even amidst the din of a lunch crowd, and the god of mischief is doing that black suit—green scarf thing again which brings out his eyes and the lunar shadows of his skin.

And Tony thinks it's terrible remiss of books and schools and studies, not to teach him what to do when Loki gives him that shit-eating grin (oysters, too damn many _oysters_) that is one quarter menace and three quarters promise, the one that exposes rows of small, sharp teeth makes him look like a shark that had been stuffed into a suit.

Really, earth's education system needs an overhaul, Tony thinks to himself as he waits for JARVIS to print out the shark-headed image he's just photoshopped onto an old photo of Loki from the New York Daily News. Maybe he'll work on that, after his little pet project with Loki was over.

Humming to himself, the billionaire draws little reindeer horns on his anthromorphic shark with a red marker and scrawls below it:

** 'Tsukiji Fish Market, Tokyo. TOMORROW. Stark Tower aero pad, 8 pm.'**

And Tony can't help but feel terribly pleased with himself.

**_~o0o0o~_**


	11. Chapter 11

11

He wasn't coming. _Bastard._

The intercom splutters. 'Sir, its 20:40. Would you like to wait another ten minutes?'

_'Yes_- No. Maybe another five. Yeah, five more minutes.'

'Yes sir.'

_Bastard._

Fine, he'll just go back to sleep. The whole thing had been a hare-brained idea anyways. A bad egg hatched on the cusp of too many whiskeys; so _what._

'Stark-'

Tony snorts. _This is what you get for wolfing down too many shit-eating oysters-_

_'Stark!'_

He tries not to scream like a girl and scramble backwards when Loki suddenly appeared in the plane, seatbelt already in place, damn his dancing green eyes.

'Fuck you.'

'I _do_ apologize for startling you, Man of Iron.'

Tony realises that he's crossing his arms like a girl from a Jane Austen novel, but who cares; it's not like Loki _reads _earth books.

'Have you ever heard of an RSVP?'

'I looked up the animal in your little visual. Truly I am flattered.'

'Only you would see being compared to a murderous rampaging carnivore as a compliment.'

'I should like to see one up close,' Loki speaks over him like the asshole he is. 'It would pass for _quite_ a suitable diversion of my time here.'

'You'll see several hung up for filleting soon,' Tony retorts as he flicks the intercom switch. 'Ok Timmy boy, take her away.'

'Yes Mr Stark.'

**_~o0o0o~_**

'You could have told me it's this easy for you to turn invisible,' Tony grumbles outside Narita Airport early next morning, blinking rapidly against the brisk 3 am air.

'You could have asked.' The god of mischief shrugs. 'I am frequently invisible.'

'You could have saved me a tonne of red tape,' Tony pouts. Although he chooses not to comment on the fact that Loki has become comfortable enough to use magic in front of him. He's trying not to smile as it is. Here they are in a city where nobody would look twice at Tony Stark, and he gets to play host to a stuffy, disagreeable deity. In Tokyo, which is maybe the world's coolest city ever.

The only downside is knowing he must look a total space cake, speaking to thin air.

'I thought you're used to the attention,' Loki scorns when he complains.

'Not _this_ kind of attention.' the billionaire grouses as yet another small Asian woman points him out to her husband whilst making a cuckoo bird sign with her other hand.

**_~o0o0o~_**

They watch the early morning fish auction at Tsjuki and the giant fishes being tagged and numbered by steely faced Japanese fishermen. Tony points out the pinbone removers, the giant saws that hack fish flesh into chunks, and the giant slicers that reduce the chunks into oval cuts or thin slices, unrecognisable from their formal selves.

They step delicately over pink-washed puddles of blood and called upon JARVIS to identify the hundreds of species of seafood being efficiently converted from dead animal to packaged goods in the world's largest seafood abattoir.

Loki breaths in the air around him like a mastiff, catching scents and cataloguing them for god knows what purpose.

Unlike most humans, the god has no squeamish notions of where his food comes from. He pokes and prods; he criticises, examines and compares; for an almost-vegetarian, Loki possesses an almost unholy fascination with meat. The scientist in Tony appreciates this. There's an honesty to it that's refreshing.

(There's also no compassion to be found anywhere, but that's for another day.)

After that, Tony whisks them off to Sukiyabashi Jiro, which he explains to Loki is a sushi bar of high repute in a dingy locale. Loki had looked sceptical, until Tony inadvertently blurts out;

'Fuck, I forgot, you're not wearing cologne or anything, right? There's a strict policy here about perfume for some reason.'

The god glance askance at him. 'On Asgard only women would resort to scented waters and pomade.'

But he looks a great deal happier after that, and made no complaint when Tony gets them both lost in the basement of the Tokyo Ginza station.

'C6, Dancer. Keep your eyes peeled for C6.'

An elegant eyebrow arches. '_Peeling_ ones eyes would cause great pain and do little to assist you.'

'It's another one of our lovely human phrases which I'm sure you'll grow in time to love. Come on, I found it.'

He drags them through a humble sliding door and into a tiny, cramped sushi bar with only ten seats, where a cagey old man with even older eyes waves away Tony's pathetic attempt at Japanese and locks gaze with Loki non-stop for five minutes in some crazy contest of wills that Tony is _definitely _not included in.

Finally the old man nods curtly and disappears into the kitchen to bark something at his minions, and Tony releases the breath he didn't know he'd been holding.

'This is place is unusual.' Loki says, shifting around and looking almost happy.

'What the hell was _that_ little show there all about?'

'You're the human, are you not? You tell me.'

Lunch was _weird_; Tony can find no other way to describe how surreal the experience is. Which is really saying something considering his life.

There is no menu, no choices. Instead the scary, _scary_ old man and his assistants made sushi in front of the counter, which they placed piece by piece in front of Tony with nothing new appearing until the previous piece has been consumed. Granted the food is fantastic; even to Tony who's no stranger to quality. There's no time to talk however; no time to relax or make any of the usual banter with Loki that Tony suddenly realises that he's come to sorely depend on.

As for its ancient proprietor, Jiro can teach_ classes_ on the art of silent intimidation. Small wonder he and Loki had that electric eyes thing going, which Tony is not jealous of in _any_ way.

It's disconcerting. Tony feels like he'd been shuttled of to some odd sort of discipline class that involved being quiet, keeping your head down, and wolfing down as many pieces of sushi as you can, which pretty much makes it the strangest Michelin star experience ever. The billionaire ends up spending most of lunch avoiding Jiro's probing stare and trying not to burn his tongue on the exceptionally hot wasabi, and this is _not_how he'd anticipated his Tokyo jaunt to go down so somebody back in Stark Co is going to get _fired_ when Tony get back to New York.

At the end of the meal (in which Tony feels relieved and unaccountably accomplished for some reason), Jiro abruptly goes over to them and with one imperiously cocked finger, motions to Loki to follow him into the kitchen. This is apparently unprecedented, because there is a collective (_very_ polite, _very _Japanese) gasp of shock and awe, followed by a flurry of cameras clicking

Tony tries to draw his arm back; 'Heyyyy, are you sure you want to do th-'

Loki of course ignores him, the prick, and disappears behind a curtain amidst a cloud of speculative whispering. When the billionaire tries to follow suit, he finds his path blocked by two surprisingly burly assistants.

'Urm. Loki?'

Silence from within. Tony cocks a worried eyebrow. Who knows what mischief Loki could be up to in there? Could he be mind-controlling Jiro to make him watermelon sushi? Or heavens forbid, could they be-

_Naahhh._ Jiro looked to be eighty, if he was a day.

(But then who knows what alien gods found attractive?)

Tony clears his throat. 'So I should really check on my, urm, associate, he speaka-de no-ah Nippon, yu-ah under-stan?'

He looks hopefully at the assistants, but no salami; and they look as if they moonlight as sumo wrestlers. Tony should have brought the suit. Why didn't he bring the suit?

'Ok, fine. I'll just be _right_ here. Waiting.'

Thus the billionaire finds himself twiddling his thumbs for a good ten minutes, ignoring the other murmuring patrons around him until Loki suddenly appears again, bearing a box. Which he slides immediately out of view under the table.

'So-' Tony begins, and Loki immediately cuts him off with a look that could freeze ice.

'I am ready to depart, Stark.'

Tony exhales irritably. '_Fine._ I'll get the bill.'

**_~o0o0o~_**

Tony would love to call the whole exercise a failure, but one look at Loki would make it evident that the god of mischief considered it the opposite; slouched over a reclined seat, his long legs crossed at the ankles and an almost mellow expression on his face.

If anything, he looks on the verge of humming.

Occasionally Loki's eyes would stray to the mysterious black gift box that Tony swears upon every relative's grave that he'd one day investigate, come hell or high water.

For now though, they had a six hour flight and several jars of olives to go through.

**_~o0o0o~_**

'Stark.'

_'Tony.'_

'I have enjoyed our excursions.'

Well, that is something at least. 'Glad to hear it, Reindeer Games.'

'Although your transport methods are truly primeval.'

'Shhhhh, you'll hurt her feelings. It's alright baby, daddy loves you,' Tony rubs a reassuring palm over the walls of his G650 and scowls at the god of mischief. 'This is the fastest civilian plane you'd ever get into, Jingles, and FYI, 704 mph is practically the speed of sound.'

'Really? I find it a miracle that you get to any your heroic missions on time.'

'For that I take the suit, which I'd offer to fly you around on, but it might make for a slightly uncomfortable ride.'

'Uncomfortable for whom?' Loki asks, and there's an edge of tease in his voice, Tony is _sure. _Except he can't really tell, and Loki's inscrutable expression is driving him crazy. Especially when Tony realises that Loki has leaned over to better engage him in conversation, which place their shoulders flush together; trailing black hair and cheekbones within grazing distance – and oh, _wow_. Eyelashes. Like a _cow._

'Uncomfortable for you, naturally,' Tony says, and his voice comes out hoarse because his brain is busy pointing out that he only has to shift an inch or so further closer to make things suddenly go very _wrong._ Almost as if Loki could read his mind his cow-lashes flutters like a breeze had picked them up (ridiculous, they were in an _aircraft_) and Tony can feel his palms getting wet again because Loki is smiling at him with the smile of a shark and-

-and the air is getting kind of thin because of _cabin pressure, gooddammit. _Nothing else.

Then the god of mischief is turning away to refresh his drink, and Tony gratefully sucks in _air_, just in case it's his last.

Now is a good time to give himself a pep talk: remember that it's all fake, Tony-boy. It's a _disguise. F_or he knows, Asgard's true form is eight legs, cuttlefish skin and hairy udders.

'Perhaps you underestimate my capacity for _discomfort,_ Stark.' Loki's eyes actually crinkle in amusement as he went right back into invading Tony's space after that minor interruption.

_'Tony.'_

'And what will you give me in return for calling you by such familiar terms, _Anthony?'_

Tony licks his lips, and watch the cow lashes flicker about like moths. Things are really not going very well, and maybe next time he should think about bringing the suit to make sure there's at least a layer of hard armour around between kinky alien moonstone skin and heated human flesh-

'Anthony-'

'Yes- _what.'_

Tony's not _really_ gritting his teeth as he says that. Neither are his eyes almost squeezed shut, it's the cabin _pressure_, goddammit, because this is a _really fast_ plane.

'Are we about to kiss now_?'_

And _that_. That must be how Hiroshima feels like, because Tony's bottom had fallen out.

'You knew.' Actually, of course he knows. A fucking inanimate object would know. His pilot probably felt the heat through the cockpit walls.

The mischievous expression on Loki's face could power a New Year countdown in the dead of winter. 'I was waiting for you to, ah- _cotton on_, I believe is the term your Migardians use.'

Tony is busy exhaling irritably, and grits his teeth through a rather painful time of it as it catches up. He feels cheated somehow. And his body is still _not_. Cooperating. _Goddammit._

'Well, why the hell dinchan say something.'

At this the god drops his eyelids, looking almost modest. 'I have an uncommonly sensitive sense of smell.'

'Means what, you're part bloodhound?'

'It means, _Anthony,_ that I can actually smell when someone's intention towards me changes,' Loki informs him, apparently deriving infinite amusement from the situation. 'Especially if he's a male someone, on account of the Miguadian musk you mortals tend to spray around in your hubristic bid to retain one another's attention.'

'We'll make sure that you never get into a subway then,' Tony huffs.

'Indeed I'm not certain humanity might survive the experience of my horror thus expressed.'

Tony laughs weakly. At least the sexual tension that been practically charring his lungs earlier had dissipated.

Loki suddenly rises over him, almost practically climbing into his lap. 'I shall give you a few days to adjust to the shock.' the god informs him with that most evil of voices – a _promising_ one.

'And then, _Anthony-'_

Tony simply gapes at him, brain scrambling to catch up.

_'Loki, wait-'_

A long finger on his lips silences Tony's brain utterly. Tony's brain has switched off. _Goodnight coherence, see you tomorrow, _and Loki's face is much too close, the whisper of his voice much too intimate.

'And then, Anthony, we shall have ourselves a little _conversation_.'

And then the god disappears with a crack, leaving Tony alone in the cabin to stew in discomfort and dread.

**_~o0o0o~_**

AN: Jiro is the eponymous, super famous sushi chef from the documentary 'Jiro Dreams of Sushi'.


	12. Chapter 12

12

Tony Stark walks whistling into the SHIELD meeting room the next morning, calls out the usual greetings to the gang, takes his seat, and looks up to find a table full of faces staring silently at him.

_'What?'_

'You were whistling.'

Tony crosses his arms defensively. 'Yeah? So?'

Natasha purses her lips. 'You sound almost chirpy. In fact you're downright _happy.'_

'And you were home _late_ last night,' Steve adds with a frown.

'Probably went out and caught something incurable,' Clint prophesises, sounding way too happy about it for 10 o'clock in the morning.

'A guy can whistle if he wants.'

'Nope,' Bruce shakes his head. 'Not you.'

'Not in _this_ section of the am, buddy.'

_'_You people _need_ to get a life that doesn't include spying on your betters, be-'

He's forced to stop as Fury bangs open the meeting room doors and stalks in with Maria Hill.

_'Can_ it, Stark, we have a meeting to get into.'

Tony scowls. 'I didn't even _start_ it.'

Fury ignores him from long practice and goes straight into the heart of the matter. 'I'm sure you all know why we're here, Avengers. As of yesterday Thor has given us news that Loki is back on earth, has _in fact_ been back on earth for some time now. We've in the midst of doing a sweep of all the street cameras and satellites in every major city here, but it's highly likely he'll be in hiding and could be anywhere in the world by now.'

'Why'd they send him back after all that trouble taking him away for judgement?' Awwww, Steve. Always asks all the necessary questions nobody else wants to be caught dead with.

'How the hell would I know how these bloody aliens think? Now, Thor is back on Asgard making an appeal on behalf of the United States government for his people to retrieve Loki from whichever rock he's crawled under to hide and lick his wounds. So until we hear word from him, the Avengers is on high alert,' Fury growls. 'A scorned deity like Loki would be desperate enough to try anything, pushing for vengeance to recover his lost pride, and unlike Thor his sentence actually _allows_ him to retain some of his original powers.'

'That's just retarded-'

'Why would Odin take Thor's powers away, but not for someone who's so much more dangerous? Someone they'd call the _Liesmith?'_

'Can he still place people under thrall?' Clint interrupts tersely, and Tony gives him a thumbs up for the best question he's heard for all morning.

'Thor assures us that its' no longer possible,' Fury says, but Clint doesn't seem satisfied, although he skulks back into his seat.

Tony can commiserate with such a concern. Maybe he should exchange notes with Clint, find out if being under the god of mischief aroused symptoms of wanting to place the back of his hand against a pale jawline, trace the dark flutter of eyelashes against his fingertips; wonder how it would feel like to taste Loki's lips and-

Tony crosses his legs.

_Also feeding urges._ Right. He'll make a note of that. Could be on to something.

'So far, all we have is Thor's story, and no way for us to corroborate,' Fury was saying. 'It seems that Loki would want his full powers back as soon as possible, and misbehaving whilst on parole is not going to help.'

Tony tunes out again because it looks like they're going to be at this for the rest of the meeting. He's feeling pretty certain by now that Loki has no 'agenda' at the moment, at least not one beyond a massive sulk of godly proportions. He wouldn't be half as relaxed in Tony's company otherwise, nor would he be willing to kick back his heels and go on random jaunts eating his way through half of New York City and Japan.

Nopes. This is a god with time to burn on his hands; and Tony figures he's just been given carte blanch to do whatever he likes with Loki for the next few weeks. Maybe even the next few _months._ Luckily for him Thor is absent again because Tony isn't sure if he can listen to another round of Thor's mournful 'he ain't heavy' remix.

By the time Tony gets back to listening in on the conversation the remaining Avengers (and Fury in particular) are still expressing their wroth (heh) over one Asgardian god of mischief and his unfortunate propensity to somehow make it back to earth everything they get rid of him. Then they talked about what it means for the Avengers to have a Dangerous Alien At Large in New York, fate of the world, blah blah blah. Followed by an exasperating one hour and forty minutes of pure speculative exercise on what new dastardly plan Loki could be up to.

Let it be put on record that Tony Stark stayed awake for more than half of this briefing before his two vodka Redbulls wore out.

By the time Clint wakes him up a good 20 minutes later by lobbing crumpled balls of company stationary at him, Fury has moved on to waxing about Asgardian irresponsibility in not incarcerating their own criminals instead of treating Earth like a giant Alcatrez. Or a fledging Australia.

So he pulls out the Starkpad and start scrolling through a bunch of open tabs on the best locales for shark diving. The more he looks into it, the more fascinating it looks-

Until somebody throws another wad of paper at your head, that is.

Aggrieved, Tony looks up. '_What?_ I was listening.'

'Tony, we're still in meeting. You should really put that away,' Steve sounds like he is trying to talk a puppy down from taking a pee on the rug, and Tony wonders if anybody will ever have the heart to tell him that his brand of boy scout leadership is just never, ever going to work in 2013.

'I'm up to date with the intel daddy-o. Wait for Thor. Keep an eye out for Loki. Also, leopard sharks pee through their skins, did you know?'

Bruce turns to Natasha. 'How much money did we put in the pool that Ironman's banging a marine conservationist?'

'None.'

'It got equally devided between 'victoria secrets model' and 'Japanese mob boss ninja', because we made that bet after watching Kill Bill2.'

_'Dammit.'_

Fury plants his fist on the table._ 'Back_ to the agenda if you please,'

Pleased, Tony went back to his Starkpad. Nobody suspects a thing. The morning could now be chalked up to a great victory for Project Hide Loki From New York City.

**_~o0o0o~_**

'Hello, Pepper Potts speaking.'

'Pepper hey. Listen, I know we haven't caught up for abit-'

'If by that you mean you've been avoiding my calls for abit?'

'Yeaaahhh. So it's a quick one this time - remember the time you used to own a cat?

Pepper's response was so instantaneous that Tony winces at the displeasure in her voice.

_'Oh no_. No, no, _no_, _no_. Not _you_. You're too _irresponsible_ to keep a cat, Tony'

_If only she knew the HALF of it._

'Come on, I'm not that bad. My fifth grade project hamster stayed alive for weeks.'

'You were ten then, and far more accountable.'

'Ouch. That's really bellow line, Peps. '

'At least keep something you don't have to _feed._ Like a tamagochi.'

'I resent that. I happen to _like_ feeding animals, it gives me a sense of, ah, accomplishment.'

'Tony, cats are more work than they look. You can't treat a cat the way you'd treat a dog; you cant play with it whenever you _feel_ like it and it's not going to follow you out for a walk in the park.'

_'Aww,_ no park walks? I love park walks.'

'And some cats can be very demanding.'

Tony chokes down the laugh that threatened to give it all away.

'Ok gotta go, bye.'

_'Don't _do it Tony,' Pepper warned. 'You can't just _pick up_ some stray from the roadside and not think of the consequenc-'

_-click._

**_~o0o0o~_**


	13. Chapter 13

13

Tony handles being attracted to things he can't touch the manly way, by hanging over the balcony railings and morosely making his way through a bottle of scotch.

Of course, it's pure coincidence that he takes to spending more and more time on the highest balcony of Stark Tower.

Hey, he's paid a _fuckton_ of money for the view; might as well get something out of it. (Bruce had asked if he was all right. _Of course_ he's all right. Jeez, can't a guy spend some time getting drunk on his own balcony?)

So far he's spent the night running both his kidney and his whiskey collection ragged. Productive bottle counting method, really. First you empty it, and then you count it. Tony's counted the same bottles four times. Maybe after another bottle he'd be able to finally get the numbers right. After _two_ bottles actually, because symmetry is next to godliness.

Where was he again? That's right, sorting through internal arguments about Loki. About the necessity of staying the _hell_ away from Loki and alerting SHIELD. About the inexhaustible reasons why continuing this no-name game _thing_ of theirs is a bad idea – bad on an interstellar level.

Bad on a you-might-not-come-out-of-this-alive-Tony level.

Besides, Tony doesn't do man crushes. He does slinky, doe-eyed sex kittens with bodies as ripe as time can make it; not lean, sinuous jungle cats with a feverish, half-starved flame in their eye, carefully banked into a patient ember but_ still_ there, still burning and Tony can _see_ it. In fact; he's pretty sure he's the only human being to have _ever_ seen it this close up.

And the knowledge of it burns his brains, and _will _not be forgotten.

It's almost fitting then, that this night of churning guilt and indecision would start almost as a copy of that first day they'd met, for Tony to look up from his balcony, bottle in hand, and see Loki standing suddenly before him, nose to nose again except now there is no knife –

Because, ah- because now that _knife_ is somehow turn to careful words and flashing eyes, now that _knife_ is the temptation of flesh revealed; (white throat, black hair) now they are _both_ exposed, for Loki wears no armour and Stark no iron suit _but there is still a knife_ –

But where it is hidden, Tony knows not. Somewhere along this game, the rules are changing beyond his ability to grasp them. Somewhere in this_game,_ a knife spins in the air between them at an equal distance, waiting for the first draw, and Tony will _not_ be cut by this.

He has never played to lose.

It says something then, that since Tony has not gone to Loki, the god of mischief has come to him. It says too much and they both know it, and Tony wonders if their _game_ is coming to a head.

Is says much that Loki breaks the silence first.

'You have been remarkably silent,' the god says with soft menace, 'And I care not to be overlooked.'

'What, no hello?' It is a feeble joke and Tony knows it, but his stomach is suddenly churning and he feels the significance of the conversation that is about to come; lying like a stone in his gut.

'I would ask you to explain,' Loki says dryly as he steps lightly onto the balcony, '-were I less certain I could believe it.'

Tony means to answer, he really does, but the silence goes on for so long that mere words would not usurp the power of the naked reply one makes without talking. He notices he can no longer feel the cold. Loki seems willing to let him make the first move, prowling the space like a restless, distrustful lion caught in a space he does not trust.

So. First meeting after Loki lets the proverbial cat out of the bag. First time he's played chicken and stayed away from Calatrava Tower. First night Tony might be in real, actual danger since the night their drunken games begun.

It's a lot of firsts.

But he's fucking Tony Stark, he can handle anything; even letting gods down.

'Can you really smell _anything?_ I mean, does intention have a smell? Can you smell what I'm thinking right now, cos I'm not sure I believe you-_'_

'I can smell lust. And sickness. I can smell the scent of rot upon a mortal body, such as yours.' The god approaches him on silent feet, sideways, and Tony can feel the very air around him sharpen with electricity. 'It is intriguing that the very _stench_ of death upon you offers me no offense, Anthony. It is passing strange, yet here is_ truth_ from the god of lies. The question is; will you take me at my words, Son of Earth?'

And Tony is both consumed by fire and locked down by ice; struck down Loki's words and made dumb, and it is several long moments before his throat is able to work.

'This is not in the _agreement.'_

'Your agreement was to keep me _entertained_, Man of Iron. Consider my form of diversions… slightly altered.'

'And my planet?'

A belligerent tone creeps into Loki's voice.

'I have no interest in subjugating Migard; which has so little to offer. It is an amusement, not a threat. Your lives are short; your people narrow-minded, your technology embryonic save for yourself and a small handful. Your planet can barely sustain itself and your ecology is tempestuous and fragile. Indeed, it is a paltry sort of planet for a god.'

'Thanks for the ringing endorsement.' Tony croaks. 'And you will not lead more Chitauri to us?'

'I _should_ _not_ have to explain myself, and would _not_; had this not been such …extenuating circumstances.' Loki exhales, clearly summoning his patience before he continues.

'But you _are_ human for all your cleverness, and mortals do ever like to hang on to meaningless _reason_, as if knowledge of the _true_ chaos which governs the pace of life and death would render you unutterably lost. I have said before, Stark, that yours is a race meant to be ruled. Your kind_craves_ it, deny this not. You _invent_ gods, and when _real _ones show themselves and reveal the truth of of that which you are, you make them onto demons and cast them from the highest cliffs – there to break upon the rocks. And then may you celebrate their feet of clay, taking joy in the fall of those beings bigger in brilliance and purpose than yourselves – and being done with even that, go back into your holes, back into the decay of your lives, to once again tremble and pray for some new divine power to lend you purpose and take it all away. And so it goes.'

Loki's smooth, prowling jungle-cat walk stops in front of Tony, so close he could see the sheen in the black linen of his tunic; the twisting arabesque of serpents embroidered on the dark vest. 'So tell me _Anthony,_ is _this_ the glorious purpose you wish so much to be part of?'

'If you are so godlike, then you should be wise enough to see know that I bat for my own team.'

'That needs not always be so. Indeed you are a different sort of creature, Stark, and aside from that lamentable lifespan of yours there is little to acquaint you to this- _meagre_ earth. This you do know.'

'I'm n-'

But the words wither in this throat as the god's bleak gaze descends upon him, peeling off skin and sinew and drilling deep down to the bone.

'In the depths of your mind, Anthony, you have _never_ accepted constraints.'

_'No._ I _cannot-'_

Clenched fist suddenly locks upon his shirt, hauls Tony up onto tiptoes before he can draw breath.

'Say no,' Loki snarls into his mouth, 'and it may be the_ last_ thing you say.'

And the god's face burrows itself like a snake into the space between his neck; tasting the air without touching it – breaths in the scent from Tony's quivering, _tender,_ terrified human skin.

And Loki, god of lies reveals in an mocking, almost rueful tone. 'All I can smell upon you is the foulest stench of _death_, and yet.'

A hand clamps down suddenly hard behind his neck before he thinks to struggle, the grip an iron collar.

'And yet I_ want_ it,' Loki seethes, and then his mouth is on Tony's.

It is not a warm touch. Loki's lips are the touch of a blade, coldest iron. SIlvertongue. Loki's kiss is no kiss but a forge; an anvil, and Tony's brains gibbers _he is_ _unmaking_ me but his mind and senses are separate things now, impossible to come together. He is sure he moans into the god's mouth; the humiliation of it should eat him alive but for the fact that Loki's strange magic seems to have frozen all protest from his lips.

Loki takes, and Tony has no choice but to let him; his mouth tastes of mint tea and ozone and a bitter, unrequiting cold. There is a frozen burn upon his lips when the god pulls away and sets him back on his feet, and Loki is breathing clouds of cold upon his face, although the air had been warm just moments ago.

He supposes he should be grateful that Loki is allowing him time to recover.

_'Why_- why me,' Tony finally wheezes, lips shaking through a mouth gone numb with cold.

'I do not know, and gods do not know everything,' Loki admits with a candidness that makes Tony gape. 'But I have never been one to deny myself. Tis enough Stark, that I _want.'_

The billionaire chokes out an ironic huff of laugher. Loki's answer is the sort of thing people would use to describe _him,_ and isn't that the simple truth of it, Tony thinks – the glue between them, the attraction, the sheer hedonistic selfishness, and (though the word be employed only in the lightest sense;) the strange _empathy_ that seems to have crossed this chasm to draw them together.

They were both men (well, one of them is) accustomed to taking what they wanted, without thinking twice of the consequence.

Loki's eyes are hooded; his eyelashes flutter at half-mast, moonlight-tipped and deceptively fragile and _beautiful_; and the combination of too much alcohol and too much stress is making Tony lightheaded because he thinks about smoothing his palm against this face; he fancies he should like to marvel at how mortal it feels, how human. And making itself increasingly vocal is a sharp and mindless _want,_ like a thorn under the skin that Tony can't quite dislodge.

'I am waiting for your answer, Stark.'

Tony keeps the bravado up only because he knows he'll unravel the day it comes crashing down.

He might just unravel anyway.

'I guess I could,' Tony swallows as their cheeks graze. 'For science.'

Loki hovers an indefinite moment over him, expressionless and unmoving, before finally tilting his head down to press a chaste kiss upon the corner of Tony's mouth. Huh.

Not what he expected. Not that he's expecting to get instantly ravished there and then on the balcony, but _still._

He can feel Loki's smile like the edge of a blade, stretching against his lips. Cold.

'Of course. For _science.'_

**_~o0o0o~_**


	14. Chapter 14

14

Steve corners him after breakfast whilst he's waiting for the lift and Tony's first thought is _busted_, followed by _hide the evidence_.

'We need to talk.'

'What, no preamble Cap-cap? Not at all like you, but that's cool cos I do like my talk with a side of dirty-'

Steve crossed his arms. 'Is there something you want to tell me, Tony?'

'Bruce did it. In the bedroom with the garden hose, and he got creative- '

_'Tony.'_

'Why am I getting the fifth amendment here, anyways? I've been a good boy; I haven't made a peep in _weeks.'_

_'Exactly so,_' Steve pounces on him. 'You've been acting shifty, Tony. You've been missing meals, spacing out at meetings; JARVIS says the labs are gathering dust. You've abandoned all your projects-'

Tony is going to _dismantle_ JARVIS. He shrugs instead. 'So I needed a break, everybody needs a break.'

'No Tony, that's not it and you know it.' Steve hesitates. 'Are you having an affair?'

There was definitely an uncomfortable pause there that Tony could have filled faster. A _lot_ faster.

'Define _affair.'_

'I mean are you _seeing_ anyone? You know.'

'You know my record, so the answer to that would be- yes Steve, I'm seeing _everyone.'_

'Yes, but you never had any qualms bringing 'everyone' home before. Are you - are you seeing somebody's _wife_, Tony? Because if you are, you need to stop rig-'

'Whoa, whoa, Cap, for the record, Tony Stark does not _need_ to do that. Who's been GQs most eligible bachelor six years in a row? Come on, look at this_ face_,' the billionaire waggles suggestive eyebrows and hollows out his cheeks at Steve, who immediately looks like a fresh-faced mormon who'd been given a year's supply of gay porn.

'Alright fine, stop doing that, you look as if-'

'As if I'm giving a blowjob?'

Aww, Cap was so cute when he starts trying really hard to look everywhere else.

'Fine. But if I get suspicious again I'm going to sic Natasha on you,'

'Threats from Captain America, what would the children say?'

'Your wisecracks won't work on Nat, and she's coming for you _real soon, _funny man_.'_

Time for a stinkybomb. 'Fine. But I feel it's only fair I get to ask you in return, Stevie Wonder - are you _seeing_ anyone? IS there something going on between you and Nat?'

God but he loves watching Mr Wholesome's face turn seven shades of red.

'My relationship with Ms Natalia is very _proper _one,' Steve splutters, 'There's no way I would even consider besmirching her good name-'

'Cap Cap Cap, nobody in his right mind would doubt _that. _But what if it shouldn't be? A woman in exile, all alone-'

'Stark!'

'Awww lookie, Cap's face matches Tasha's hair now. Speaking of which, haven't you ever wondered if she's a natural redhead once you p-'

Steve gives him a wounded look as he turns pointedly away. 'You're a terrible person, Tony_.'_

'It was just getting interesting!' Tony calls out over his retreating back, and grins to himself when the door slams.

Mission accomplished.

**_~o0o0o~_**

One day Tony will look back on this and laugh his head off, but for now, it's a big enough job trying to stay quiet and just_ breath_; to not scream as he's pushed gently back against the sheets by a god's body bearing down upon his own.

Because Tony had fooled around with men and women and once even a machine (_not_ one of his own, ewww); but this is, this is-

This is a bad idea on an interstellar level. The blackest of comedies. The most ironic event in Tony's life. It is Friday night and he should be getting drunk with the guys and hacking into Steve's new karaoke box to mess with the lyrics of all the Diana Ross songs he and Bruce likes to sing.

Instead he's on his back, his tee shirt a ripped and useless thing hanging forgotten from Loki's fingers, and the god is staring with alien, unholy fascination at the arc reactor on Tony's chest.

'This thing keeps you alive.'

_'Actually, _it's there as a night light.'

_'Hmm,'_ Loki reaches out a hand and Tony immediately bolts upright again, arms instinctively blocking access.

'I really don't think you need to touch that._'_

'I need to know if I have the_ means_ to assist you,' Loki says as he pushes him back down. From his fingertips a green light glows almost amber in the dark.

Right. Assistance from the batshit crazy god of lies in the form of magic glowy things about to enter his chest. Tony starts hyperventilating and licks his lips. Now is probably a good time to dig out one of those spare bottles of martini that Tony keeps in _every_ room exactly for days like this. And get into something that would be a little less easy to tear off than his tee shirt. Maybe his suit. Yeah, that would be a good idea.

Above him, Loki seems to sense the direction of his thoughts and somehow contrived to give him an impression of heavy eye-rolling without so much as a blink.

'Do be still. You _have_ already put yourself in my hands thus far, have you not?'

_Nice_ reminder that his life is forfeit with any false moves. Why is Tony half naked in front of a psychopath god again? Is his libido_ truly_ that stupid?

'I really think-'

'Be _quiet.'_

The answer is yes. His libido really _is _that stupid.

Tony flinches violently when the strange light from Loki's fingertips enters his chest like a sharp, cold wind that saws through bone and makes Tony gasp with the cold shock that suddenly seizes his lungs. The feeling vanishes before he can scream, but his heartbeat is like a caged bird, and he knows now what it feels like to be trapped under a saber-tooth tiger.

Really _not_ something he want to repeat anytime soon. Assuming he survives this first time.

Once again Loki hushes him and places his ear against his chest, listening intently to something that must be whispering back at him. Tony hears nothing, save for his accelerated heart and the fear in each exhalation.

For long moments they lie like this, Loki's face upon his chest, his fingers a deceptively tight touch on Tony's wrist, holding him still. What he sees or hears within, Tony cannot tell.

Presently he looks up with an almost malicious smile. 'You are good at saving your own skin, Antony Stark.'

'Yeah. I kinda like my skin, so I _really_ hope I'm not losing that touch.' Tony hesitates. He's lost hope in finding a cure years ago, and feels leery of resurrecting it. It's something he wants too much, something that would only raise the stakes again in their little game.

'They're shrapnel, those things in my heart.'

'Yes. I know. Fifteen pieces, each smaller than the last. You live on borrowed time, Anthony.'

_Fifteen._ Tony's heart clenches. The most advance scanners in human technology had detected twelve. Even if they had the means to operate, the remaining three would have instantaneously killed him, and nobody would have known why.

Nobody on earth, anyways.

'Can you- would you be able to remove them? So that I can take out the arc reactor?'

Loki looks almost surprised at this. 'You wish to remove your source of power?'

'It's a dependency I could do without, yeah.'

'You will lose the use of your suit without it,' Loki mummers, 'Become helpless. You will become so much easier to kill, Man of Iron.'

'Yeah. Yeah I'll take that. There're other ways to get into a suit.'

'I may be able to help you,' Loki announces in a voice of calm indifference. 'Or I may not. The procedure will be a complex one and requires further study, and possibly many trials before anything may be attempted upon you in safety. And it shall be a challenge, yea, even onto a god.'

Tony didn't even need to think about it. 'And the price?'

'Why Antony, shall we speak of payment whilst in bed, like cheap women who do barter with their bodies for tricks ?'

'I _know _who you are, god of lies.'

'I see, ' Loki's eyes are lowered, his lashes obscuring what thoughts Tony might try to read there. 'Well. Perhaps one day we can broker a deal.'

He looks up at Tony and adds wickedly; 'But it will not be today.'

Clearly unspoken in Loki's profane expression is the sly, knowing look that burns within those bright green eyes - _you will not leave this bed till I am done with you - _and Tony knows with an unutterably sense of fate that all escape is blocked, not whilst the god of mischief is dangling the lure of a cure within his grasp.

Tony damns Loki for it, the Faustian bastard. But more than that he damns himself.

**_~o0o0o~_**


	15. Chapter 15

15

Tony draws as much breath as he can into his rattling lungs. Just in case he forgets later. Which is, you know, _highly_ probable, because he's just painted himself into The Corner Of Irrevocable Sexual Consensus with the god of mischief.

How things had gone from a few harmless drinks several weeks ago to _this,_ the billionaire has no idea.

'Is there _really _no way to back out of this?'

'No' Loki says with an air of finality. 'I will have your body, Anthony, with or without your consent; although it would be far more pleasurable for us both if you participate freely.'

'Gee, so many choices,' Tony says weakly. 'What's a poor girl to do.'

Loki's lips quirks. 'You are afraid?'

'Yes. Absolutely. Don't know how I'm not wetting the bed by now, actually.'

'You will feel little pain,' Loki assures with a mocking gentleness that claws out little bits and pieces of Tony's lungs and fills it with the holy fear of god. 'I will see that you enjoy this as much as I, Anthony.'

'I'm a bit afraid of that too, truth be told.'

Loki studies him with a kind of speculative curiosity, as if he's trying to decide what sort of animal treat would best work on him. And then the god kisses him again, open mouthed; cold and wet - his tongue a heavy, velvet weight delving into Tony's mouth - forcing it open wider, and then wider still until the whole excercise begins to feel _remarkably_ obscene. Its too fast and too much, and his mouth is too full and too _invaded - _and Tony moans in protest but the sound of it just makes him feel weaker and more vulnerable, so he wrenches away, gasping for air and excuses.

'Are you sure you want to do this,' Tony pants, 'because I bet the Pope would have some very _stern_ things to say about human-deity mating practices.'

'I care not a whit,' Loki tells him distractedly as he deftly removes Tony's trousers. 'Do hold still Stark, you're as fidgety as a virgin on her wedding night.'

'Oh, oh, you're going to _pay_ for that comment.'

'Anthony,' Loki hauls him up as if his (naked? he's _naked_ now?) body weight is a triffle, and pulls their faces together.

'As charming as I find you on occasion, would it kill you to be serious for once? Because if you don't, you just might-just-find my arm accidently_slipping_ over your clavicle… and breaking it.'

The god punctuates his sentence by giving said body part a rather thorough lick, and Tony's mind gibbers and then stays blissfully silent.

That is, until he finds his legs unceremoniously hoisted and doubled up against the god's hard torso as Loki rolls his hips and spine off the bed.

'Fuck, Loki, FUCK, I'M NOT SURE I CAN BEND THAT FAR.'

'Stop talking, Stark.'

_'Tony!_ Maybe we can slow the fuck down. I mean, you're not even naked.'

The god merely smirked. 'I assure you, my clothes are quite easily divested when the time comes.'

'Loki, I- oh god-'

'Shhhhh,' is all Loki says as he shifts more of his own weight againts Tony's legs, forcing them further apart. 'I have promised you a painless exercise of it, Anthony, and it is in my power to do so. Do not make me regret it.'

Thirty eight years and a crazy life, and Tony have never been in such a humiliating position in his _life, _with his legs up in the air and his entire body exposed to the rapt, hungry gaze of a psychopath god. He stops talking as Loki's hands roams the length of his hips; light feathering touches that makes Tony bite down on his lips in an effort not to moan or arch up to the touch. The bastard, of course, avoids Tony's more perky body parts (he really should die humiliation from _that _alone) and concentrates on the sensitized flesh just below the fleshy rise of Tony's arse, raising swaths of goose-pimply skin with his skimming hands.

He starts cursing again once Loki's nimble fingers found his hole and begins circling it like a shark before prodding experimentally at the puckered flesh.

'FUCK,' Tony curses as he feels the pressure of Loki's finger pushing pass the ring of muscles. Trembling, his legs are _already_ trembling from the pressure of it all - and they'd barely even _started. _

He starts babbling again. 'We should have a safeword. Can we have a safeword? Safeword please? How about _ohmygodstop_, that's a good safeword- or blueballs. Yeah, let's make it blueballs.'

'If you like.'

_'Blueballs!'_

'I've not started yet.'

'Really, and I thought we could all go home now.'

There is an exasperated huff of amusement above him, which Tony would take as a score. Anything to delay the _very_ frightening inevitable of what is surely NOT HAPPENING TO TONY STA-

– _oh god he could feel Loki's finger sliding into him. All _the way up to the knuckle. Jesus. He bites down a gasp as the finger withdraws, invades again, then begin to fuck his channel in smooth, shallow movements.

Oh, J.H. Christ Tony Stark is being fingerfucked by an alien.

'_Fuck. Fuck.'_

'Not quite yet, I think.' Loki says with a smile in his voice, and Tony decides he'd rather not look too closely at the god's face. It's almost certainly going to have too much Smug in it.

Then Loki makes some sort of hoarse noise at the base of his throat and insinuates another finger, and Tony's back arch and he makes a _really_embarrassing mewling sound that makes him want to cut off his own tongue.

'Relax,' the god mummers, and Tony wriggles a little against the slight burn of it; this was just two fingers, how the fuck is he going to handle anything bigger – but then the pads of Loki's fingers heat up, and Tony can feel himself being heated and lubricated from the _inside_, which is freaky as hell.

'Did you just fill my ass with _alien slime_?'

'Mmm,' Loki says distractedly, his eyes almost amber with intensity turned inward, and Tony decided that he really doesn't want to know what is really going on with Loki fingers inside him. 'It will not harm you.'

'Yes but is it.. biodegradable? Will my insides melt –oh_hhh-hh._'

Because Loki's fucking alien slime is heating up in Tonys ass _right now_ and making everything more- _tingly._ In a tingly, boneless, putty-as-a-purring-cat sort of way that his brains can't really handle.

_'FUCK,' _Tony says eloquently, because if he survives this, alien slime is going to make him the richest man on the planet and have legions of playboy bunnies kne- _oooshittttt Loki is scissoring- Loki is- nghhhhh._

'How does that feel?' the god mummers as he works his fingers wide apart inside, stretching and warming him.

Tony clenched his muscles on Loki's fingers and tried to get his eyes to stop rolling to the back of his head. 'I think I'm dying.'

Loki scissors him again, and Tony's brain activity goes down another notch; reduced to incoherent whimpering, his head lying low and his ass in the air being opened up wide by strong fingers.

'You are beautiful like this,' the god breathes; his voice dark. 'I shall take you soon, Anthony.'

And Tony can hear and feel the thrum of desire within the god, like approaching thunder or maybe a train wreck, and he's never been simultaneously so turned on and so goddam sacred in his life. Maybe it _might_ just be worth dying for. He wonders if he'll ever have sex again after tonight, and the thought makes him choke out a breathless gasp of laughter.

So the _very_ long list of Improbably Situations Tony Stark Gets Into apparently now includes getting buggered by alien gods.

'You laugh because you're afraid,' the god of mischief says with a fond shake of his head, as if he finds Tony's fear adorable. Fucking prick.

'You would too, if you've heard half the stories I've have about alien probes.'

'What delectable comic timing you have,' the god says dryly and suddenly Tony can feel the blunt edge of Loki's cock against his hole, the ring of muscles trembling in anticipation of its breach. All his false mirth evaporates like mist under a sudden furnace.

'Oh. _Oh.'_

'You are ready.'

'Noooo, no I'm _not_, and-' something occurs to Tony and his voice rises into a shriek: '_how the freaky flying fuck am I feeling THAT THING with your clothes still on?'_

'Magic, of course.' Loki shrugs, although his eyes are wicked. 'Only one of us needs be naked for this, and it isn't _me._ Now close your eyes, Stark, and think of America.'

_'Now_ you get earthy with me,' Tony mumbles. He's just trying to stay concious, because he's pretty sure if he fainted Loki would just slap him awake and continue anyways. And god, he thinks fainting might be an unavoidable option: even just resting there against his skin it feels too big. Whatever type of- of _instrument _of doom this alien possess, it's too damn big and Tony is 100% sure what they are about to attempt will not be humanly possible.

Which means he's probably going to die tonight. Pepper would be _so _furious.

'I always wanted to meet my maker whilst in bed, but this wasn't what I had I in mind.'

'I didn't make you,' Loki said, deeply amused.

Tony licks his lips. 'You know what? You can _have_ New York. Who needs neighbours anyways?'

'You are surprisingly anxious for a man who usually shows no fear. I have said I would not hurt you, Anthony; would you doubt the words of a god?'

'Is that a trick question?'

'Even gods are bound by their oaths.'

'You're the god _lies._'

Loki smirks. 'Well then. I suppose you will just have to-_ pray_.'

**_~o0o0o~_**


	16. Chapter 16

16

Truth be told, Tony Stark has never indulged in gay sex before.

He's been to all sorts of parties (some of which barely deserves so lawful a name); and he's been in bed with men. But it has always been with a woman present, and although Tony has no qualms kissing or intimately touching a man in the heat of debauchery, it's always been in the spirit of fun and games and a great deal of impishness. Tony has no qualms groping a butt or having a pervy wresting match; no qualms with harmless flirting and drunken kisses performed to catcalls and hoots. He hurt no one with his antics and prefers to keep the world guessing - but he's never seen himself as gay or even truly bi; so much as just some very open-minded Joe.

Yet here lies Tony Stark, on the threshold of crossing every line he'd ever drawn on the sand.

If only he knows why.

At the first breach of Loki's cock and the first pangs of pain Tony's mouth opens and involuntarily cries out without his permission. Tony is brave when he is brave, but then there are things for which he feels no bravery. This is one of them, and so he cries out shamelessly and draws big gulping breaths and loses the cool objectivity which usually serves him so well.

And Tony babbles. There is a lot of babbling.

Somewhere in there he is sure he even begs, for the burn within him is intense, even with the strangely numbing properties of the lubricant. And buried somewhere even deeper is a part of Tony that is surprised at Loki's willingness to reassure him with innumerable small touches and soft whispers – telling Tony that his fright is ill-founded; that he would be safe, if not a little sore. A considerate god of mischief is as alien to Tony as alien is. As alien as what they were doing tonight. As alien as the strange emotion being seeded within him as he stares into Loki's face – destroyed by the invasive rawness of this experience.

He is breached. He is _touched _in some incredible space within him that he knew not existed until now_._

Tony whimpers and tears leaks out of his eyes, and he wishes he could say they were all due to pain. In truth there is not half as much pain as he expected, for Loki holds himself steady with an inhuman strength, moves so subtly and with such stillness that Tony hardly notices his entry until he is completely sheathed within him.

'You are tight,' Loki whispers darkly, 'yet you shall accommodate me.'

For all his intensity, Tony isn't 100% sure that he's turned on. His dick is hard, leaking even, but his dick has the relentless curiosity of a pup. Hell, his subconscious might be turned on by the danger of being naked in bed with an alien. Or Tony could be just suffering from a severe form of stress that makes him receptive to inter-species buggering. He could wake up tomorrow perfectly hetero, and then what?

He blinks and distracts himself with the intensity of Loki's fey, unholy eyes, the coolness of his moonstone skin, now that Loki has finally seen fit to vanish his clothes.

'I guess you want to move now,' Tony quavers at him once he is capable of speech again.

'I can wait,' is all Loki says, although his voice his tight. 'All night, if needs be.'

So much for Tony's hopes that the god would pronounce him a bad lay and roll of the bed.

He shifts experimentally, and finds Loki glaring at him from above, so close that Tony can feel the sweep of his hair. His words are jagged with effort.

'Do not _move_, Stark. Not as long as you wish me to remain… motionless. '

'So your, uh-_ thing's_… not going to expand anymore right? I mean you don't have spikes hidden or some sick-as-fuck penis shape-shifting ability, do you?

Loki's dry laughter came as a huff, as even he seems to be having trouble controlling his breathing. 'Not unless you wish it.'

And then he braces his weigh on one arm and reaches for Tony's cock with the other, and only when Tony is gasping to the firm, relentless rhythm of Loki stroking his cock does the god finally begins to move within him, starting shallow and impossibly slow and gradually building up. It is some time before Tony notices that he is no longer protesting; hadn't been for some time now; and somewhere along the night his body has adjusted itself to a _very _surreal sort of comfort zone.

The pressure on his own cock from the god's clever fingers makes an increasingly maddening counterpoint to Loki's cock filling him with sure, firm strokes. And just as Tony begins to think he would survive the experience and ride its crest out after all, Loki suddenly changes angle and hits his prostate, and Tony sees stars.

See stars, and maybe the face of god.

The change is not lost on Loki, if the smirk he gives Tony and the smooth, confident thrust of his hips is anything to go by. Tony can feel the lubrication spilling in wet trails down his thighs, stimulating the sensitive flesh of his cleft as Loki introduces him to his prostate. The wetness make everything seem more dirty, and dirty make Tony's cock leak enthusiastically and offer itself as a participant.

He tries to give as good as he gets – without much success, because every time he tried to lead Loki's next trust would end with some sort of fancy hip twist that made Tony yowl like a scalded cat, and whenever a single coherent thought entered his head the god would somehow sense it and increase the pace and variation of his trusts.

The wet slick sound of it is disgusting; filthy and exceptionally loud in the night and punctuated by Tony's breathless yelping and Loki's throaty encouragements. Tony doesn't think he's ever been so hard in his life, until Loki finally makes one final jerk of his hips and Tony feels as if his organs are being rearranged, he thinks he can feel Loki's cock in his stomach, he thinks he's going to scream, or praise god, or fucking _faint_ like a g-

'Come _now,_' Loki mummers in a voice as wrecked as Tony feels and suddenly he loses his grip, his back arching helplessly as release hurtles through his body with the force of a gale. He's sure he comes screaming but its ok because he's probably dying, and this is a great way to go.

After that they both collapse like rag dolls on the bed. Sweat plasters his hair, runs down his chest and pools in the palms of his hands.

'You have done well, Anthony.'

I'm not a circus poodle, Tony thought dizzily. He should feel more resentful about it, but his brain informs him that it can't really handle anything beyond _I've survived the most intense alien sex ever._

'Does that mean I get a cookie,' he croaks instead.

'You shall be rewarded for such prodigious performance,' Loki whispers into the shell of his ear, licking the sweat off Tony's neck and jawline; '-as I have claimed you and made you mine.'

Kaaaaaay that last part Tony is just going to ignore for now, because his bones had melted off. He doubts he'd manage so much as a crawl right now.

Tony will just have to make known his protest – tomorrow. Assuming he ever wakes up.

**_~o0o0o~_**

He opens his eyes a split second before the phone starts vibrating on the nightstand, and stifles a groan of disbelieve at the light flashing red from his phone; the Avengers calls to arms.

Tony drops his head and mutters an oath into the pillow. So many weeks of peace, and _tonight_ is the night something big happens.

The alarm has gone off for now, but it will come back, and the other Avengers are no doubt rousing themselves now. He will be missed within minutes. Ten if he's lucky.

Loki's limbs are splayed, soft and careless in sleep, and Tony takes a moment to appreciate the unguarded beauty of it.

_Look ma, alien on my bed. Can we keep him?_

He is about to rise when an arm suddenly pins him down.

'Urm.'

Loki's eyes are not opened, but the pressure on his chest tightens.

'Stay,' the god mouths, his voice hoarse and barely audible.

'I have to go,' Tony hesitates as one green eye opens in obvious displeasure. 'I'll come back.'

The look on Loki's face is impenetrable, green eyes gleaming with preternatural light in the darkness.

'So _this_ is how it is to be.' But he allows Tony to leave the bed.

The first thing the very cold, very fragile mortal does is snap on the suit's magnetised cuffs. He breaths a little easier when he feels its cool weight against his skin like an ever-reliable friend. Only thus armed does Tony dare to turn around and face Loki again.

Well, he turns around _very _slowly, because he's hurting in very, very embarrassing places right now. And nobody can blame him if his voice comes out a little thin.

'My first priority will always be earth. And the guys who take care of it.'

Loki seems to stifle a sigh at this. 'Then you have not been _listening_, and I see I will not persuade you with words alone. But _go_. Go and then- return.'

Tony knows one of his cheap pavalers would be in poor taste now, so he merely nods and activates his armour. He is aware that Loki is carefully watching the construction of the suit around the mortal; memorizing the position of each panel as it slides into place. Likely making notes of all its vulnerabilities. He is aware that this is a revellation that Tony has no right to make, not as long as he is an Avenger and part of a team that works so closely together.

He is aware, that to topple him would be to topple them all.

And yet Tony does this, for what mad impetuous, he knows not. Perhaps he's far underestimated the stealth of Loki's magic or the depth of allure the god is capable of weaving into his webs of treachery.

He turns to leave, wondering if perhaps he'd been so compromised that it was best to turn himself into SHIELD.

_'Anthony.'_

Tony stills at the precipice of the balcony doors, and after a moment, turns around.

'One more thing,' Loki looks at him with an expression that seems simultaneously invested and detached. 'The _girati _have massive regeneration skills and breathe with their kidneys because migard's air is poisonous to them. On no account should you destroy the heads of these creatures. Shoot them in the belly, preferably at distance.'

Tony would thank him, had his brain not been shot dead by shock, so he gapes at Loki instead.

The god covers his eyes with a weary hand, as if he tired of the conversation. 'It is a simple fact I offer, no more. One you would have discovered for yourself eventually.'

'Thank you,' he says. There is little else to offer in the strange air between them, and Tony knows little of the ways between two enemies who have inadvertently wrought something of great but as yet unknowable consequence. Tony feels this shift instinctively in his gut. He just hasn't a godamn clue what to do with it.

The god of mischief drops his hand, revealing a look of fractured lust in his eye that Tony would subsequently learn to read as Loki's brand of covetousness, bordering on obsession.

'_Go.'_

Right. Tony strides clanking across the bedroom and throw open the balcony doors. Best fly before the erratic god changes his mind and turns Tony into a bug under his glass or some such.

'I'll come back soon.'

'Nay Stark,' Loki says lazily. 'You'll come back _unharmed, _or there will be hell to pay_.'_

It would almost be flattering, if it wasn't so fucking scary.

**_~o0o0o~_**

ONE MORE CHAPTER LEFT! :P


	17. Chapter 17

17

Ironman flies straight to the rendezvous point, listening to the bickering between Fury and Steve on the commlink on the best way to take down New York's latest bunch of gate crashes. Apparently the new monsters are _huge, _although they aren't many of them. Each is taller than a house, coming in through some tear in the atmosphere that Tony really needs to sit down and discuss with a bunch of astrophysicists very soon.

Clint is whistling, which means the other Avengers have already spotted the creatures. 'What are these damn things even _called?'_

'Who cares? Its alien, and anything alien gets taken _down.'_

Steve is still arguing with Fury. 'Don't we have _any_ intel at all on these things? I don't want to accidently put one of us in the way of harm-'

'What the hell are you fools for, if not to go _out there_ and find out-'

'Director Fury, with all due respect - my team is _not_ dog bait f-'

'Guys _guys_,' Tony finally reaches the party, ignoring the various expressions of irritation or bemusement his team shoots him. 'Why don't we just ask our honourary resident alien? Thor?'

'Alas Man of Iron, I regret I am not as learned in creature lore as mine brother. Had Loki been here, he would instantly be able to identify their specifics and weaknesses.'

Clint laughs derisively. 'No offense dude, but Loki is almost certainly responsible for this flusterfuck-'

'Mine brother is in exile. He does not have the _magic-'_

'When has anything like that stopped the likes of-'

_'Enough,_' Captain America said. 'Now is not the time for theories. Avengers, deploy yourselves.'

The Black Widow loops off first. 'I'm going to recon up ahead; see if I can figure out how they communicate.'

'Be safe, Nat.' Cap's voice is heavy with worry across the commlink, and Tony couldn't help exchanging grins with Clint.

'Hey Tin Can, fly me up to that ledge. Twenty seventh floor.'

Tony picks him up and drops him on the ridiculously tiny strip of ledge. 'Bit narrow even for you, Hawkeye. Are you going to be able to pull back that bow?

'Watch and be amazed.'

'Look sharp, because I've got this tingly feeling that all your pretty arrows will play a really important role today.'

'You_ always_ get a tingly feeling when you're near me,' Clint grins. 'But I do appreciate your heartfelt feelings for me and my appendages of power, Ironman.'

'Good, because I might need you for something later. Hasta la vista, baby.'

'Fifty bucks says Black Widow's not going to eat her next mate.' Hawkeye says outside of the commlink as Tony flies away.

'A hundred bucks says her next mate will be all netted up and bedded down before the year is out.'

'You're on, Tin Can. Prepare to lose.'

'She'll roger Captain Rogers before Christmas, or I'll eat my faceplate.'

'You'll break your teeth. Better start making some falsies then,' Hawkeye advices with mock earnestness.

Ironman flew to position, cameras whirling to capture, interpret and transmit any intel of consequence. The buggers are _huge; _soft skinned and armoured. Definitely humanoid, but something about the ponderous way they move, as if the earth air is thick and mucous-like, makes Tony's skin crawl.

The creatures clearly have no real strategy though, merely bumbling forward like herded animals, which probably means that behind all this lies an invisible shepherd. He'll have to interrogate Loki about this; the guy simply knows too much. And more ominously, how would Loki know who the Avengers were fighting, unless he was responsible for unleashing these monsters in the first place?'

Tony shrugs to himself. No point worrying now. He'd just open fire on their lower extremities like Loki said; pray the treacherous bastard is telling the truth, and then have the other Avengers follow suit.

He can hear Bruce mutter into the commlink. '_Thousands_ of years the aliens leave us alone. Then overnight they _all _want to have a party here on earth.'

'That's what we're here for.' Steve said grimly. 'To tell them to go play somewhere else.'

'Yep,' Ironman lands on the roof opposite Hawkeye with a thump. 'Meet the Avengers; glorified mummy and daddy control squad. Time to give the little darlings _detention_.'

'Avast thee, Aliens!' Clint crows.

_'Except_ you, Thor.' Natasha amends diplomatically.

'Yeah Thor, except you.'

The Asgardian god grins with good humour. 'You are gracious to spare my feelings, but I am not offended.'

'Listen up, Avengers; we will initiate operation X-form and _wait_ for my attack signal, we want to w -'

Ironman opens fire.

**_~o0o0o~_**

Fury roars at him like an enraged bear._ 'STARK!'_

'You absolute _fuckwit, _Tony_.' _Steve shouts over the intercomm.

'Sorry,' Ironman says with no apology in his voice whatsoever. 'Look, Cap, you need to know something about these guys-'

'-went and fucking _stole_ my thunder,' he suddenly hears Hawkeye spitting on the other roof as he draws his bow. 'I had _first dips_, Tin Can.'

Ironman spins round. 'No Clint, don't shoot the _head-'_

Too late. The first three bolts fires in quick succession, their arrowheads exploding just before they reached their targets. Tony watches with amazement as three of the aliens went down immediately.

He sees Hawkeye turning to glare triumphantly at him from the other building. 'And _that_ is how it's done, Tin Can.'

So the fucking prince of lies had him misdirected. Colour Tony surprise.

_Fuck._

Nick's grim voice splutters over the commlink. 'Take them down, Ironman, and no funny business this time.'

'Roger that.'

Tony flies sullenly to the first three advancing creatures in front of him, then watches in puzzlement as the weird looking helmets on their heads expanded like cones and the cavities on the alien chest suddenly lengthen and folds upon itself like a skirt – essentially protecting its most vital organs.

Steve's voice buzzed in again. 'Ironman, why aren't you shooting?'

'I'm looking for an aim.'

'Tony. You're airborne and the target is _right in front of you.'_

Ironman ignores him and searches fruitlessly for an aim, cursing the fact that he hadn't taken more chances earlier. But the creatures he had shot are still standing motionless; whilst Clint's arrows has permanently disabled three with no adverse effect aside from some additional armouring on the remaining monsters, which frankly made them all look quite comic, as if they are about to hitch up their shiny new skirts and dance a can-can.

Yet Tony does not want to disregard Loki's advice; at least not yet.

_Fuck._ There's nothing to do but shoot at their kneecaps in the hope of disabling them.

Ironman opens fire, expelling a lengthy round of semiautomatic. Some of the creatures dropped and all of them stop advancing, but they open fire and retaliate, sending huge beams of power scattering everywhere and crashing chunks of building materials onto the roads below whilst the remaining Avengers scatters.

Fury's yelling explodes through the intercom. 'Shoot to _kill,_ Ironman! You aren't here to take your enemies out to _dinner!'_

_Funny he should say that._

'Cap-' Natasha's disembowelled voice was urgent. 'The fallen ones. They're coming _back_ up again.'

'Fuck.' Tony bites back a curse as his cameras whirls, feeding the images to the rest of the team. The three creatures Clint took down earlier are regenerating. Only each fallen creature turns up regenerating as _two, _so six stands where there were three.

_'Holy mother of god.'_

'Per aspera ad inferi,' Natasha mummers, apparently to herself. Perhaps she was praying.

_'Inferi?'_ Clint's voice over the commlink took on an extra strong doze of _crazy_. 'Did somebody fucking say _Inferi?'_

Clearly the man still has issues over mind control – even if its undead, alien mind control.

'Clint, my _darling?'_

'Uh-uh.'

'Darling. Pumpkin pie. Aren't we bosom buddies and honey bunnies?'

He could hear Hawkeye's long suffering sigh even through the rapid zing of arrows. 'With my life. Although you deserve it like a hole in the head.'

Tony grins. 'I need you to aim for the kidneys with those spiffy exploding arrows of yours.'

'The kidneys,' Hawkeye's voice colours with doubt. 'I have limited arrows in a vulnerable position, and if this doesn't work we're screwed.'

'I need to show Cap what he's doing wrong. Trust me.'

There is a one second pause. 'One order of kidneybeans coming up.'

Tony's heart clenches with gratitude. _Bromance_, dude, he's going to kiss Clint on the mouth when this is all over, with tongue and everything.

'You're the love of my life, Barton.'

'I'll have my lawyers hold you to that.'

'Anything you want.'

'The G650.'

'Except that.'

Hawkeye cocks an arrow at him. 'Get out of here before my hand _slips.'_

Ironman is making a beeline for the creatures, pulsars at the ready when Clint fires his first volley of arrows. Unfortunately they bounce completely off the new armoured skirts the creatures are wearing.

_'Fuck_ that new Spring Line Collection.'

'Hawkeye, what the hell-'

'Sorry Cap,' Clint sounded almost gleeful; '-you can clip my wings later. Ironman's too.'

_'STARK!'_ Fury yells.

'I know, I know, I'm grounded forever. Poor me.'

'Release the hulk, Captain America,' Fury orders.

_'No. _Don't do it, Cap._' _Ironman immediately halts mid-flight and commands JARVIS to locate Steve.

'You're going to have to give me more than that, Ironman.'

'Release the hulk before these monsters destroy the whole city! This is an _order_, Captain America,' Fury pulls out all his authority cards as Tony lands in front of Steve and yanks his mike out with a muttered oath.

Captain America takes his wire out as Ironman approaches. 'Tony-'

'Cap, I'm telling you. Do _not_ fucking go for the heads.'

'The heads are the biggest targets! What do you know what we don't?'

'All right, these guys? They're called _girati_. Slow but virtually indestructible. Our only advantage is that the air here is poisonous because they currently breathe from their kidneys; and the _best_ message Earth can send them loud and clear, is that this aint a good playground baby, our air's poisonous so go home.'

Steve is giving him a look as if he doesn't know who Tony is anymore. 'You've never been this secretive before, Tony.'

'I have my sources, and I trust-' Tony falters. No he doesn't. Of course he doesn't trust Loki; Tony might be reckless, but he isn't _stupid._

'Just trust _me_, ok? I know what I'm doing. These few are probably on some sort of suicide reconnaissance mission anyways. We deal with them once, and it's over.'

'Avengers, stand down.' Steve's eyes drill into him. His voice is hard, taut with dissapointment. 'You have three minutes, Ironman.'

'This scheme of yours better work, Stark,' Fury threatens over the commlink.

'Fine.' He snaps his visor back. 'Just follow my lead and keep Bruce the fuck away. Thor buddy, I need your hammer.'

'Man of Iron,' the alien god's voice booms into the commlink, making him wince. 'I am yours to command.'

Tony thinks he can get used to this. 'See those pretty skirt things they're using to protect themselves, Thor? I need that boomerang hammer of yours to strip them so that the rest of us can gut them where it hurts.'

'It shall be the work of a moment, for verily Thor has much experience removing skirts,' the blond god boasts as he raises Mjölnir and sent it flying against the creatures, either knocking off their shield-like skirting or crumpling them to the ground for the Widow or Captain America to deal with. Tony flies around, offering himself as target practice to the slow-witted _girati_ and shooting them in the kneecaps or the guts whenever the opportunity arises. Human weapons, he finds have little effect against the monsters until Thor removes their alien armour.

It's just as well that Mjölnir never misses.

Above them all Hawkeye empties arrow after arrow into their exposed gastrointestinal, laughing to himself like a maniac. As usual, Tony can never quite tell if Clint is a really cool guy, or just really deranged. Maybe a bit of both.

Tony receives the biggest confirmation of the truth in Loki's words when the creatures start collapsing one by one, sinking to their knees as a thick, gruesome black substance started bleeding out of their heads. A couple of them even explodes from the chest, as if the pressure in their lungs had popped like balloons. But his elation quickly falls when he spots a flash of green in the distance, rapidly approaching.

Somebody's let the big guy out.

Tony curses then, long and loud into the commlink. 'You dumb fucks. I _told_ you to keep Bruce away from this.'

Roaring, the Hulk rushes past them, its two great arms picking up a car on the way - which it hurls at the aliens as if lobbing a bowling ball. Tony takes to the air and Cap sidesteps easily and rolls away from the explosive results, but Thor being nearest to the monsters, picks up half a dozen surface wounds.

'Thor-'

'Do not fret, Man of Iron, for these wounds are as paper cuts onto me,' Thor boasts. 'We shall mount the heads of our enemies on the wall and feast on their flesh come supper!'

_'Urm. _Yeah ok,_' _Tony says, and leaves it at that. Homicides and entrail-eating tendencies probably runs in that royal family or something.

They manage to lure the Hulk away only after he had pounded a substantial number of the _girati_ into the pavement. Tony is pretty sure the United States President is going to make substantial budget announcements soon; something along the lines of 'monies for rebuilding stuff aliens and Avengers destroy'. SHIED has all but evacuated the civilians, a thankfully small number due to the relatively earliness of the day.

Unfortunately, one of the aliens Hulk smashes is against Clint's building, sending its charring remains against the tight ledge that Hawkeye is perched upon and sweeping him right off.

Tony watches in horror as Hawkeye falls like a shot sparrow from the sky.

'_Clint!'_ Natasha's scream tears through the commlink.

Ironman doesn't have enough time to catch him the ordinary way. But he _does_ have time – just barely, to cannon ball them both into the side of a building, managing to turn the suit around only at the last minute to absorb the impact against the shattering glass.

Then he falls to the ground still holding on to Clint, grateful for Cap's shield as it rolls above them both to protect them from the worst of the falling debris. Explosions continue to go off in the distance, but Tony knows the fight is over. They've won.

Thank _fucking_ god.

Clint is lying very still on top of him.

'Hey, pumpkin pie.'

Silence.

Ironman raises one arm and pushes the shield away. _'Clint.'_

Should there be this much blood? There shouldn't be this much blood. _Oh god._

_'Please be ok please be ok,' _Tony chants, and slaps the man cradled in his arms. 'Wake up!'

He almost cries in relief when Hawkeye finally stirs. Tony finally slackens, and decides to just continue lying on the rubble without moving. Rubble can be comfortable, given the right incentive. He'll just lie here till kingdom come. Or a crane. Whichever happens first.

'Oh Tin Can,' Clint slurs at him, finally sitting up and spitting blood. 'We need to stop meeting like this.'

'What, and spoil the romantic storyline of a generation? You did good there, princess.'

Hawkeye merely smiles into the dawning sun, eyes closed. 'Yep. Yep I did. G650 kinda good, I should think.'

'Oh honey, you definitely cracked your skull _real_ hard on that building.'

'One day, Stark, you're going to _beg _me to take that plane off your hands.'

'You just keep on dreaming, sugar bun.'

Soon Clint is lifted off him by SHIELD support staff, although he refuses to leave - and Tony looks up to find all the Avengers standing around him. The uniform grimness of their expressions marks him for having run out of time and excuses.

'_Tony,' _Steve's voice is like a noose around his neck. 'I think you have some major explaining to do.'

Raising his hands, Ironman tries to stave off the team's darkening mood. 'Before you string me up for salting, just remember who saved the day.'

Natasha narrows an eyebrow. 'How'd you know stuff that even _Thor _couldn't tell us?'

'Because I _told_ him, of course,' a familiar voice drawls behind them, and Tony doesn't need to turn around to know its Loki standing behind him, making use of the breaking daylight to highlight the dramatic timing of his entrance, the sneaky little fuck.

_'Brother?'_ Thor gapes.

'I see,_'_ Tasha murmurs.

'-the'_fuck?_' swears Clint.

'Tony.' Steve sighs.

**_'STARK!'_** bellows Fury.

And Tony gives up and lets his head fall back into the concrete, because his life is now officially full of _fucked._

[FINI]

**_~o0o0o~_**

Author's Notes:

Aaaaaand that wraps up all 17 episodes of **_'Oyster Sashimi, Olive Martini'!_**

Up next, the drama continues with **_'Iced Mint Tea + Sympathy'_**. Will the Avengers kick Tony out for sleeping with the enemy? Will Tony be able to muzzle Loki from laying waste to earth via the awesome powers of SMEX? Will Loki eventually get tired of watermelons? Is there _really_ a cure for Tony's shrapnel-stricken heart?

THANK YOU FOR READING AND COMMENTING!

As usual, if you enjoyed this, leave a tip in the reviews section please. It makes a hulluva difference to us writers, especially whilst ploughing through scripts at 4am wondering why we can't have normal stamp collecting hobbies like everyone else.

Lots of 3!  
Lucius Complex


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